Resource Type

Mine seismicity and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (open access)

Mine seismicity and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty

Surface and underground mining operations generate seismic ground motions which are created by chemical explosions and ground failures. It may come as a surprise to some that the ground failures (coal bumps, first caves, pillar collapses, rockbursts, etc.) can send signals whose magnitudes are as strong or stronger than those from any mining blast. A verification system that includes seismic, infrasound, hydroacoustic and radionuclide sensors is being completed as part of the CTBT. The largest mine blasts and ground failures will be detected by this system and must be identified as distinct from signals generated by small nuclear explosions. Seismologists will analyze the seismic records and presumably should be able to separate them into earthquake-like and non earthquake-like categories, using a variety of so-called seismic discriminants. Non-earthquake essentially means explosion- or implosion-like. Such signals can be generated not only by mine blasts but also by a variety of ground failures. Because it is known that single-fired chemical explosions and nuclear explosion signals of the same yield give very similar seismic records, the non-earthquake signals will be of concern to the Treaty verification community. The magnitude of the mine-related events is in the range of seismicity created by smaller nuclear explosions …
Date: December 9, 1998
Creator: Chiappetta, F.; Heuze, F.; Walter, W.; Hopler, R.; Hsu, V.; Martin, B. et al.
System: The UNT Digital Library