Underground pressure characteristics analysis in back-gully mining of shallow coal seam under a bedrock gully slope

We studied underground pressure and its mechanism during back-gully mining in a shallow coal seam under a bedrock gully slope, by means of physical simulation, numerical modeling and field monitoring. The results show that the intensity of underground pressure is related to its relative position at the coalface. The underground pressure is intensive and the support resistance reaches a maximum when the coalface is at the bottom of the gully, whereas the underground pressure is moderate and decreases gradually when the coalface passes the gully. The mechanism of these changes is analyzed when the slope rotated in a reversed direction to the slope dip during back-gully mining and form an unstable, multilateral block hinged structure, due to slipping. The subsidence of multilateral blocks is considerable when the block fragmentation is small, resulting in enormous changes in the underground pressure. With an increase in the mass of the block body, the block displacement will be reduced in conjunction with an increased clamp effect by both the unbroken rocks and broken rocks in the goaf, resulting in a decrease of the underground pressure.