With the increase in cover depth of the coal seam, more and more rock bursts have occurred in deep coal roadways. The conventionally used passive preventive measures are not sufficient to reduce rock burst hazards in deep coal mines. To address this problem, this study firstly evaluated the abutment stress applied to the roadway surrounding rock by constructing an abutment‐stress‐transfer model after roadway excavation. Then, according to different positions of roadways in the coal seam, roadways are classified into three types: shallow‐buried roadway with hard surrounding coal/rock; deep‐buried roadway with soft surrounding coal/rock; and medium‐deep–buried roadway with medium‐hard surrounding coal/rock. Stress criterion and energy criterion for rock burst occurrence were proposed according to the three types of roadways. The rock bursts that occurred in stope 32 of Gucheng coal mine in China agree well with the calculation results. Finally, an active rock burst preventive approach (long borehole destress drilling) is suggested before intense supporting measures are adopted during roadway construction to prefracture the coal seam or competent strata. The efficiency of this method at different excavation stages is evaluated by examining borehole drill cuttings. The whole roadway was excavated without any rock burst after the borehole destress drilling method was implemented.

This study investigated the mechanism, prevention measures, and control methods for earthquake disasters typically occurring in mines with thick and hard rock strata. A mine stope with large faults and thick hard rock strata in Hebei Province was taken as the background study object. Then, theoretical analysis and numerical simulation methods were adopted in conjunction with field monitoring to explore how horizontal stress evolves in the thick and hard hanging roofs of such mines, potentially leading to mining earthquakes. Then, based on the obtained results, a mining design method was proposed to reduce the horizontal stress levels of earthquake mitigation. The results showed that, under the control of large faults, semiopen and semiclosed stopes with thick hard rock strata are formed, which cause influentially pressurized and depressurized zones during the evolution of the overburden movements and horizontal stress. It was determined that the stress concentrations mainly originated from the release and transfer of horizontal stress during the rock fractures and movements in the roof areas, which were calculated using a theoretical estimation model. The horizontal stress concentrations formed “counter torques” at both ends of the thick and hard strata, which prevented the support ending due to tensile failures. As a result, the limit spans were increased. This study proposed a mining strategy of using narrow working faces, strip mining processes, and reasonable mining speeds, which could effectively reduce horizontal stress concentrations and consequently prevent and control mining earthquakes. This study’s research results were successfully applied to the mining practices in working face 16103.

The ground pressure distributes significant variation in underground mining near fault. Fault reactivation is an important factor to induce the rock burst. Therefore, characterizing geological settings in mining areas by the geological information can improve the accuracy of simulation. To investigate the characteristic of mining stress evolution and reactivation of the F16 reverse fault during the retreat Mining‐Induced s in Yima coalfield, a three‐dimensional digital elevation model based on GIS platform was applied. The 3D geological model includes three working faces, and F16 fault was constructed by AutoCAD software. Then, the 3D geological model was imported into the FLAC^3D code to simulate the potential of mining‐induced fault reactivation. The simulation results illustrate that the footwall of F16 fault is a high stress concentration area. Affected by F16 fault and the huge thick gravel rock in the roof, the coal seam near the fault accumulates a large amount of elastic strain energy, which increases the potential of rock burst hazards in the process of mining.

Superhigh‐water backfill mining can mitigate rockburst risks in rockburst‐prone deep coal mines and reduce pollution caused by traditional cemented paste backfill. In this mining method, the width of the rib pillar between two longwall panels is important to maintain roadway stability, prevent rockbursts and water seepage. To design the width of rib pillars, this study firstly established a T‐shaped overlying strata structure model and analyzed source of stress that caused deformation of the T‐shaped model. Based on this model, the abutment stress in the rib pillar was determined. Then, the criterion for overall burst instability of the rib pillar was proposed according to the derived abutment stress. The limit equilibrium theory was applied to obtain the pillar plasticity which can be used as the criterion for water‐seepage prevention. The proposed approach was used to design the width of a rib pillar in Yineng Coalmine located in Shandong Province, China. The analysis of the microseismic monitoring results and borehole drill cuttings show that the designed rib pillar with a width of 10 m was stable without water seepage during mining, indicating the width design method proposed in this study is effective.

Compared with the traditional “dynamic‐static” load rockburst induced by working face mining, a new typical disaster with concealment characteristics has appeared in deep thick coal seam roadways, namely, static creep rockburst, the occurrence mechanism of which remains unclear. Through the method of combining theory with practice, this paper elucidated the mechanical mechanism of static creep rockburst of deep thick coal seam roadways, along with the CT inversion of its rockburst risk. Next, by establishing the creep model and three‐dimensional creep formula under static conditions, it was observed that the main conditions for the unstable creep of deep thick coal seam roadway were high stress and thick coal seam. In addition, by analyzing the unstable creep failure process of surrounding rock in static roadways, it was found that the weakening of surrounding rock strength and stress relief were the reasons for starting rockburst and reducing impedance. The mechanical conditions of creep rockburst caused by stress superposition in weak areas of the roadway under static conditions were proposed, and the criterion of rockburst possibility was given. Finally, according to the characteristics of spontaneity and time delay of such a rockburst disaster, the static creep rockburst evaluation of thick coal seam roadway before mining was achieved by CT inversion, and the research conclusions were thoroughly verified.

Rock dynamic constitutive model plays an important role in understanding dynamic response and addressing rock dynamic problems. Based on elastoplastic mechanics and damage mechanics, a dynamic constitutive model of rock coupled with elastoplastic damage is established. In this model, unified strength theory is taken as the yield criterion; to reflect the different damage evolution law of rocks under tension and pressure conditions, the effective plastic strain and volumetric plastic strain are used to represent the compressive damage variable and the equivalent plastic strain is used to represent the tensile damage variable; the plastic hardening behavior and strain rate effect of rocks are characterized by piecewise function and dynamic increase factor function, respectively; Fortran language and LS‐DYNA User‐Defined Interface (Umat) are used to numerically implement the constitutive model; the constitutive model is verified by three classical examples of rock uniaxial and triaxial compression tests, rock uniaxial tensile test, and rock ballistic test. The results show that the constitutive model can describe the dynamic and static mechanical behavior of rock comprehensively.