Rock support is a safety technique applied to minimize rock instabilities around mining openings.
At INMSO we use backfill as the main rock support technique, to enable safe underground mining, whether it’s filling a floor to mine on top, having a roof to mine below, or having a wall to mine on the side.
The types of cemented filling that we use are the following:
- Cemented hydraulic fill, consisting of a mixture of coarse and fine tailings with cement, hydraulically placed in the pits;
- Cemented rock fill: A mixture of coarse and fine aggregates, similar to poor concrete, mixed before being introduced into the pit;
- Cemented stone fill: Graduated rock cut mix, over which a cement slurry is sprayed without prior mixing;
- Paste filling: Made up of tailings and cement, with a low moisture content, transported at high density by pipeline.
An adequate fill ensures the continuity of mining operations safely, by providing greater stability to the rock mass.
