Abstract
Abstract. The profession of a miner is one of the most dangerous in the world. Among the main causes of fatalities in underground coal mines are the delayed alert of the accident and the lack of information regarding the actual location of the miners after the accident. In an emergency situation (failure or destruction of underground infrastructure), personnel search behind and beneath blockage needs to be performed urgently. However, none of the standard technologies – radio-frequency identification (RFID), Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications (DECT), Wi-Fi, emitting cables, which use the stationary technical devices in mines – provide information about the miners location with the necessary precision. The only technology that is able to provide guaranteed delivery of messages to mine personnel, regardless of their location and under any destruction in the mine, is low-frequency radio technology, which is able to operate through the thickness of rocks even if they are wet. The proposed new system for miner localization is based on solving the inverse problem of determining the magnetic field source coordinates using the data of magnetic field measurements. This approach is based on the measurement of the magnetic field radiated by the miner's responder beacon using two fixed and spaced three-component magnetic field receivers and the inverse problem solution. As a result, a working model of the system for miner's beacon search and localization (MILES – MIner's Location Emergency System) was developed and successfully tested. This paper presents the most important aspects of this development and the results of experimental tests.
Highlights
The coal mine is a complex engineering structure with hazardous working conditions where sudden changes in geological conditions, combined with abnormal operating conditions, the lack of appropriate control equipment and safety violations, may lead to accidents with serious consequences.As an example, in Ukraine, 3120 people were injured from 1994 to 2003
miner’s responder beacon (MRB) was located at a distance of up to 40 m in the room behind concrete walls in terms of direct and indirect visibility
Rescue team instrumentation was installed inside the bomb shelter, www.geosci-instrum-method-data-syst.net/5/561/2016/
Summary
The coal mine is a complex engineering structure with hazardous working conditions where sudden changes in geological conditions, combined with abnormal operating conditions, the lack of appropriate control equipment and safety violations, may lead to accidents with serious consequences. In Ukraine, 3120 people were injured from 1994 to 2003. In Russia, 1822 people were fatally injured during the same period. China has the highest number of accidents in mines. Despite the fact that it owns about 35 % of world coal production, the number of accidents with fatalities is more than 80 % of the world total (Xiaohui and Xueli, 2004). In US mines, 36 people were killed in 2012 (Mineweb, 2016)
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