Surviving winding-frame structure at the Tharsis railway mineral-processing terminal of Corrales, near the estuary of the Odiel.
The Malacate de Corrales formed part of the Departamento de Corrales, the coastal terminal of the Minas de Tharsis mining system in the province of Huelva. Situated at Corrales in the municipality of Aljaraque, at the end of the 47-kilometre narrow-gauge railway that connected the pyrite extraction centres of Tharsis and La Zarza with the export pier on the Odiel estuary, the site served as the final stage of mineral processing and loading for the Tharsis Sulphur and Copper Company Limited. At Corrales, arriving ore was crushed, classified, sampled, and stockpiled before shipment.
The malacate — a winding or hoisting frame — formed part of the industrial infrastructure of this terminal complex. Mining activity across the Tharsis system concluded in 1999 when the last train ran, and the Departamento de Corrales subsequently fell out of use. The surviving malacate remains at Corrales as a prominent industrial landmark, standing alongside the former railway station building, and has become a recognised start point for heritage trails along the former railway line.
The Departamento de Corrales was the seaward terminus of the Minas de Tharsis pyrite mining and transport system, one of the most important mining enterprises in the Iberian Pyrite Belt and in the whole of Huelva province. The mining operation that created this complex was reactivated in 1853 when the French engineer Ernest Deligny visited the sierra of Alosno and secured concessions over the ancient pyritic deposits, naming them the Minas de Tharsis. After a succession of French-promoted companies in the 1850s, control passed to the British-registered Tharsis Sulphur and Copper Company Limited, which developed the Tharsis and La Zarza extraction centres and built the infrastructure connecting them to the coast.
The company constructed the main railway line between 1867 and 1870, a distance of 47 kilometres from the upland mine workings to the Odiel estuary. The line opened for mineral traffic in 1871 when the company's export pier on the Odiel — the Muelle de Tharsis — opened to shipping. The terminal end of the railway at Corrales became the Departamento de Corrales, where arriving mineral was received, crushed, classified, and stockpiled before being forwarded to the loading pier for export.
A trituradora de mineral was installed at Corrales to manage the production arriving from Tharsis and La Zarza. The layout of the terminal included railway infrastructure, mineral storage facilities, and associated industrial buildings. A workers' settlement grew up at Corrales alongside the terminal complex, reflecting the social organisation typical of the Tharsis company's operations; the company built a church at Corrales that was a twin of the Santa Bárbara church at Tharsis.
The Departamento de Corrales was served by its own locomotive fleet, including diesel-mechanical Ruston tractors assigned to working the short section between the Corrales terminal and the export pier at Puntal de la Cruz, approximately four kilometres away. The Muelle de Tharsis closed to shipping in 1993, following which the embarcadero ramal was dismantled and rolling stock based at Corrales was scrapped, with some tractors preserved and placed on display in the Corrales and Aljaraque areas. The last train on the Tharsis system ran on 22 December 1999, after which the railway was officially closed on 1 January 2000.
The Departamento de Corrales then fell into disuse. The surviving malacate structure at Corrales has remained as the most prominent industrial landmark of the terminal complex, and is now used as the designated starting point for heritage walking and cycling routes along the former railway corridor. The former railway station building at Corrales has been adapted to municipal uses.
The wider Cuenca Minera de Tharsis-La Zarza was inscribed in the Catálogo General del Patrimonio Histórico Andaluz as a Zona Patrimonial in 2014, a designation that covers the railway infrastructure including the corridor connecting the mine centres with Corrales and the Odiel estuary. The Muelle de Tharsis itself was listed as a Monumento in 1997 and underwent major structural rehabilitation completed in 2026 at a cost exceeding 5.7 million euros.