Local Powerscreen dealer Emerald Equipment Systems assisted Powerscreen and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in crushing 1 ton of illegally poached ivory on June 19 in New York’s Times Square.

With an estimated street value of $2M, the confiscated ivory was evidence in several court cases brought against ivory smugglers by the U.S. Department of Justice.

A large crowd including celebrities, environmentalists and curious tourists watched as the Powerscreen Trakpactor 260 impact crusher reduced the confiscated ivory products to dust.

The Trakpactor 260 proved the perfect machine for the tight confines of midtown Manhattan — the compact foot print and the fact it is a legal transport move (60,000 lbs. and 8 ft. 2 in. [27,216 kg and 2.5 m] wide) meant moving the machine in and out of Times Square was a “relatively” simple task.

The 4 bar 34 in. (86 cm) diameter rotor driven by a powerful Scania 275 hp engine made short work of reducing a wide variety of ivory products such as carved tusks, statues, jewelry and animal carvings to worthless powder in a single pass.

The compact yet powerful Trakpactor 260 is an ideal crusher for recycling concrete and asphalt and also for crushing oversize gravel. The newly released SR model has an on-board 8 by 4 ft. (2.4 by 1.2 m) screenbox and recirculating conveyor to produce spec product with no oversize in a single pass.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had tried several methods such as burning and rolling to destroy confiscated ivory but none has worked as successfully as using an impact crusher. This was the second time a Powerscreen crusher has been used, following a similar event in Denver in November 2013 with events being planned around the world.

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