THE DECADE OF THE EXPLOSION AT "ULYANOVSKAIA" MINE. THE STATE COMMISSION AND MINING SPECIALISTS CONCLUSIONS ANALYSIS

The article provides a critical analysis of the state commission act of the explosion causes investigation at “Ulyanovskaia" mine [1], which occurred on March 19, 2007, and an analysis of several papers in scienti c journals [2], [3], [4], [5] dealing with the accident is conducted. According to the state commission conclusions methane explosion occurred at the mine at the longwall face 50-11bis where to methane was displaced from the gob area to the face with ventilation air stream. Changing of gob area ventilation depth happened due to inclusion of an additional (backup) fan into cascade installation of the mine main ventilation. However, according to the testimonies, the mine atmosphere monitoring devices at the time of the explosion recorded no methane in the mine openings at the concentrations required for an explosion. Ventilation of mine openings and 50-11bis longwall face worked in normal and safe mode, excluding excessive gas and dust concentration at the mine openings. Blasting and other re-hazardous works that could lead to an explosion of methane-air mixture were not carried out on this day. The aim of the performed work is to clarify the accident causes understanding. The authors hope that the analytical information presented in the article, at least to some extent, will help to avoid the recurrence of similar situations in the future.