GEOMECHANICS / GROUND CONTROL

Yancoal's Austar to restart

Australian coal miner Yancoal will be resuming limited longwall production at the Austar operation in New South Wales after state regulators issued an approval to restart

Staff Reporter
Yancoal's Austar longwall mine suffered a coal burst in May 2018

Yancoal's Austar longwall mine suffered a coal burst in May 2018

The New South Wales Resources Regulator had previously issued a prohibition notice to the operation west of Cessnock one day after a coal burst on May 17 that Yancoal classified as significant.

The notice was officially lifted on July 30 following the placement of additional controls. The changes included staff training in pressure bump identification and coal burst trigger action response plans in addition to de-stress drilling work.

"A further prohibition notice remains in place, which prohibits longwall extraction from the 293m chainage," officials for Austar, which has a payroll of about 200, said in a confirmation statement.

The mine will also perform controlled cutting under strict conditions up to this point, so that it can test additional controls in order to mitigate the risk of a future coal burst. It will maintain an exclusion area for works of about 50m.

Yancoal, which owns 100% of the nearly century-old Austar complex, is an arm of China-based Yanzhou Coal Mining. The mine's saleable coal production last year was 1.8 million tonnes.

A growing series of reports, each focused on a key discussion point for the mining sector, brought to you by the Mining Magazine Intelligence team.

A growing series of reports, each focused on a key discussion point for the mining sector, brought to you by the Mining Magazine Intelligence team.

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Future Fleets Report 2024

The report paints a picture of the equipment landscape and includes detailed profiles of mines that are employing these fleets

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Digitalisation Report 2023

An in-depth review of operations that use digitalisation technology to drive improvements across all areas of mining production

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Automation Report 2023

An in-depth review of operations using autonomous solutions in every region and sector, including analysis of the factors driving investment decisions

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Exploration Report 2023 (feat. Opaxe data)

A comprehensive review of current exploration rates, trending exploration technologies, a ranking of top drill intercepts and a catalog of 2022 Initial Resource Estimates and recent discovery successes.