Scientific Study and Advice on Mitigation of Silt Generation and Boulders&Debris Flow in the Coal Mine Overburden

Slope Stability is one of the major problems faced in open cast mining. Due to more recent technological advancements stripping ratio is getting increased and it has now become possible to extract coal from greater depths. Extraction of coal from greater depths results in heavy volume of overburden removal. This overburden is dumped either internally or externally and is called over burden (OB) dumps. Stability of these OB dumps needs utmost care from silts and rain cuts. A Rain cut of OB dumps is one of the most dangerous problems in open cast mines. Due to rain cuts soil gets eroded, OB slope stability may reduce and as a result slope failure may occur. Deep rain cuts in external dumps and huge formation of silt and spreading of silt/sludge over a large area surrounding the dumps generally effect coal production as well as reduce the stability of dumps. This paper deals with the study of OB dumps in Amlohri project of Northern Coalfields Limited giving a solution or advice for Water Management of dumps of Amlohri Project for minimization of rain cuts, minimization of silt/sludge formation and flow with minimization of associated damage to mining activities.