How is metal made?

Um, in factories?

Not quite.

Where in the desert? Matt, did you get lost? You should check your imagination navigation.

I don't think there's metal here.

Oh, yes, there is.

This is the Pilbara in Western Australia.

This red, rocky landscape is chock full of iron, the most in the whole world.

Where? Where? Underneath the ground?

Right here.

Ah! Like if we break it open, there'll be metal inside?

Not exactly.

Noble metals like gold and silver can be found inside rocks as pure metal.

If you're very lucky, you might find a gold nugget or a vein of silver amongst the rock.

But iron in rocks is called iron ore.

This means the iron is mixed with oxygen.

Iron ore is what gives the rocks and sand out here this lovely deep red colour.

Iron ore.

Iron and oxygen.

There's iron metal inside rocks?

But it's not like solid metal or bubbles of air.

The atoms of iron and the atoms of oxygen are joined together to make this type of rock.

So how do you turn this red, dusty rock into metal? Yeah, like the silver stuff.

First, you need to crush it up into smaller pieces.

That's one serious rock smasher.

There's actually a few serious rock smashers in this process, but let's start with the gyratory cone crusher.