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There are risks of water burst and sand inrush in the working face of the Northwest Mining Area in China. Based on the 22407 working face of Halagou coal mine, the evolution characteristics and mechanism of a two-zone failure mode of the overburden strata in shallow buried thick seam mining were thoroughly analysed using physical modelling, theoretical analysis, on-site observation, and other research methods. A method to calculate the overburden fissure width was also proposed. The analysis results indicated that the evolution of a two-zone failure mode of the overburden strata mainly includes four stages: gestation, formation, transformation, and stabilization. In the transformation stage, a fracture zone is transformed into a caving zone. The caving zone and fracture zone are separately transferred to the working face direction based on the structure type of key strata of voussoir beam and cantilever beam after the heights of the two zones stabilize, and the “two-belt” cracks are mainly composed of inclined and horizontal fissures. Based on this study, the mechanism of the two-zone failure mode of overburden strata development was analysed according to the mining height and overburden strata key layer structure. This paper serves as a guide for safe and green mining on shallow buried thick seams.

This paper studies the reliability of magnetotelluric (MT) method detection for overburden failure (OF) height in shallow seam mining. According to the geological conditions of the 52,505 working face in the Daliuta mine, five observation lines have been designed to detect the apparent resistivity (AR) of the overburden before and after mining. Analyzed the characteristic points of the face and the AR of the overburden on the main section and studied the characteristics of AR for various overburden lithologies. The AR of the overlying strata corresponding to different failure conditions is also different. Further obtained the height of the caved zone (CZ) on the working face was 25.6 m, and the height of the water flowing fracture zone (WFFZ) was 82.5 m. Finally adopted the numerical simulation and an empirical formula for calculation to validate the MT detection results and proved that it was reliable to use the MT method to detect OF height, thus providing a convenient, fast, economical, and reliable method for detecting OF heights when mining in shallow seams.

In China’s northwest coal mining area, the excavation of shallow buried thick coal seams has caused serious damage to the phreatic water layer and induced deterioration of the ecological environment. Backfilling is a basic method of controlling the loss of groundwater and reducing surface subsidence. In order to reduce the porosity of the backfill material and control the compression ratio of the backfill body, the grain gradation of the local aeolian sand was studied based on the geological conditions of the shallow buried coal seam in the Yulin mining area, Shaanxi province. Subsequently, aeolian sand was selected as the backfilling aggregate, and tests were implemented. The optimum proportion and slurry concentration of the backfill material were then obtained. The engineering application shows that the strength and stability of the backfill body based on the close packing theory can satisfy the requirements of supporting the overlying strata, and the integrity of overburden strata is competent. The maximum accumulated surface subsidence was measured to be 38mm, indicating that the aeolian sand-based backfill material in shallow and thick underground coal seam mining is able to protect the eco-environment and control the geo-environmental hazards, which are critical for the sustainable development of the mining industry and economic growth.

With the improvement of coal mining technology and equipment, the yield, efficiency and intensity of longwall working face increase continuously. However, the surface subsidence caused by high-intensity mining becoming more and more serious. This chapter starts with a definition for high-intensity mining and its current situation, and the main characteristics and index were put forward, characteristics and parameters of surface subsidence were analyzed, failure features of overburden strata caused by mining and fractured zone were studied. Some examples of high-intensity mining were tabulated including surface cracks, surface subsidence parameters and the fractured zone. Finally, surface subsidence control techniques were given, and the forecasting and mitigation measures of case histories for mining subsidence were illustrated.