Friday, August 17, 2007

Way down in the mines

The unconfined compressive strength of coal is about 3000 psi. Rock weighs about 160 pounds per cubic foot. Those miners in Utah are about 1500 feet down.

I'm not a mining engineer, but it looks to me like those "seismic bumps" are the mountain telling them that they're too close to the edge. I hope no one else dies before they get the message.

Update: Robert Ferriter of the Colorado School of Mines is a mining engineer. He's surprised that area was still being mined at all.

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