Those things get used for strip (brown) coal mining and there aren't very many of them.

They are more impressive close up.

That picture was taken as they moved the thing from one pit to another (probably close to Düsseldorf). They don't drive around very often and run on electricity. That means that thing is plugged in somewhere.

About two thirds of the way down here:

http://www.livejournal.com/users/jwz/377647.html

there's a LEGO version! Fantastic!

yeah, wow. that's really cool. I've seen these on the Discovery channel excavating coal - as Ben says - but I've never seen one in a picture where I can reference the size of it to an object from normal life (e.g. car, house)....very impressive.

Rory,

For a time I lived within sptting distance of Big Brutus:

http://www.bigbrutus.org/about.html

If you check under events, you'll find a Polka Fest. Yes, they dance polka under this thing. I always thought that strip miniers and the germans were in kahootz.

Ian -

"there's a LEGO version! Fantastic!"

I love the Greenpeace demonstration :)

..have you seen this one, yet?

German Engineering as an Art Form

German Engineering as an Art Form

What can I say, I was bored.

Scary hardware