Seismic response during a mining stoppage

Authors: Rebuli, D Download Paper Open access courtesy of:

DOI https://doi.org/10.36487/ACG_repo/2465_67

Cite As:
Rebuli, D 2024, 'Seismic response during a mining stoppage', in P Andrieux & D Cumming-Potvin (eds), Deep Mining 2024: Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Deep and High Stress Mining, pp. 1051-1062, https://doi.org/10.36487/ACG_repo/2465_67



Abstract:
Seismic monitoring after mine closures usually falls to the regional seismic monitoring system as the in-mine array is typically decommissioned during the early stage of the mine closure. This generally means only the larger seismic events are recorded and the location accuracy is usually enough to indicate that the event was on the mine. This paper examines two cases, from in-mine seismic arrays, where the mines stopped production for a significant period. The first case was for a period of more than a year and a half, in the seismically active region of the mine, while the second case was for approximately 50 days. In both cases the seismicity was found to diffuse in space as the duration of the stoppage increased. The time between successive events also noticeably increased the longer the stoppage continued. Seismicity induced by water ingress on closed mines have been studied by other authors over the years. For this study, the water ingress was controlled as the mines did not stop pumping. Therefore, the results found here are not associated with induced seismicity from flooding.

Keywords: seismicity, mine closure, mine stoppage

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