The Pirate Mines, or Mining Site is a facility on the Pirate Homeworld designed to extract Phazon from under the crust of the planet. The Leviathan's impact has caused the planet to begin changing into an entirely Phazon composed planet. This is useful for the Pirates, as they are able to use the Phazon to fuel their weapons, ships and forge armor out of it. Any unusual strains of Phazon or anomalies found while boring into the planet are reported to the Pirate Research sector for examination.