Cut and Fill Stoping
In cut and fill stoping, the orebody is retrieved in horizontal slices beginning at the very bottom and advancing upwards towards the surface. Ramps (inclined tunnels) are excavated to connect the surface to the underground ore body. Drifts are excavated to come in contact with the ore slices. The slices are drilled using a jumbo, blasted by charging the drill holes with explosives, and ore is removed by using dump trucks, or Load Haul Dump (LHD) vehicles. The ore is dumped into an ore pass, an inclined tunnel where ore is transported to a lower elevation in the mine. The ore is picked up at the other end of the ore pass by a scoop tram or LHD to be transported out of the mine through a ramp (inclined tunnel). Once a slice is completely mined out, the empty space is partially backfilled hydraulically. The backfill material used can be a mixture of sand and rocks, waste rock with cement, or dewatered mill tailings (rejected low grade ore from processing, usually fine and sandy). The backfill underground serves to keep the mine walls stable and also as the floor for mining the next slice. Mining continues upwards towards the surface until the orebody is depleted.

Room and Pillar | Sublevel Stoping | Sublevel Caving

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