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Oil, Gas & Mining vocabulary · Mine Types & Mining Operations

Underground mine

Meaning in oil, gas & mining, with examples

nounCore term

In oil, gas & mining, underground mine means: A mine where ore or coal is reached through shafts, declines or tunnels and extracted below the surface, used when the deposit is too deep for an open pit.

In Turkish: yeraltı madeni, yeraltı ocağı, kapalı işletme

How it is used

Underground work has its own vocabulary: shaft, decline (a sloping tunnel), level, drift, stope, face, ventilation and roof support. People say they work 'underground' or 'below ground' and discuss mining methods such as room and pillar or longwall.

Example sentences

  1. The underground mine has five working levels connected by a decline.

  2. Most of the coal in this region comes from underground mines.

Common collocations

  • underground mining
  • work underground
  • underground workings
  • underground mining method
  • shaftA vertical or steeply sloping tunnel sunk from the surface into an underground mine, used to move workers, ore, materials and air.
  • ventilationThe system that moves fresh air through an underground mine to supply oxygen, remove dust, heat and dangerous gases, and keep the air safe to breathe.
  • roof boltA long steel rod fixed into a hole drilled in the roof or walls of an underground tunnel to hold loose rock layers together and stop them falling.
  • longwall miningAn underground coal mining method in which a shearer cuts coal along a long face under moving hydraulic roof supports; behind the supports, the roof is allowed to collapse.
  • open-pit mineA mine where ore is dug from the surface in a large, stepped hole that gets wider and deeper over time, instead of through underground tunnels.

More terms: Mine Types & Mining Operations

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