In underground mining the harsh environment and the possible dangers from rock fall or bursts always leave a certain residue risk to personnel on site. Therefore there is an ongoing trend towards full mechanisation and then automation of the mining process.
But some tasks are difficult to automate and the need for maintenance of the equipment underground still needs some personnel in potential exposed areas.
Today we see early research and development in robots, which are expected to replace the human workforce in underground mining within 30 years.
CITATION: Berner, M, Sifferlinger, N A and Moser, P, 2019. Reduction of personnel in exposed areas, safety devices and early steps towards robots in mining, in Proceedings Future Mining 2019, pp 2933 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).