Assessment of pot-hole subsidence risk for Indian coal mines

Ground subsidence induced by extraction of coal seam belowground brings about changes in surface environment leading to trough and pot-hole subsidence. Pot-hole subsidence is extremely hazardous and does not give any prior indication before its occurrence. In India, several pot-holes have occurred in the coal mines of South Eastern Coalfields Limited triggering the need for in-depth studies. In line with the requirement, literature review and field investigations were conducted to develop an in-depth understanding of various parameters influencing the occurrence of pot-holes. The critical parameters identified were rock to soil ratio, depth to height of extraction ratio, brittleness index of rock and rock density. Risk assessment of pot-hole subsidence has been done by developing an empirical rating approach named as pot-hole subsidence rating (PHSR), involving the critical parameters with suitable corrections for certain structural and mining conditions to obtain corrected PHSR (CPHSR). CPHSR was then applied for all the 34 pot-holes studied and it was found that all the pot-holes fall under Class I and Class II category of risk representing a very high to high risk class. An effort was made for the estimation of pot-hole depth utilizing the developed CPHSR in both the development and depillaring cases. The developed approach was found to yield consistent results in pot-hole depth prediction.