A thorough understanding of mining-induced overburden deformation characteristics and the associated stress redistributions are essential to effectively manage complex safety and environmental issues that arise from underground mining. This is particular for mining in deep environments. This paper presents a numerical modelling study on a kilometer-deep longwall coal mine where a thick sandstone aquifer is situated approximately 200 m above the working seam. The mine adopts a special mine layout with narrow and wide pillars between longwalls and areas to manage water inrush and coal burst risks. The modelling results show that overburden deformation stops at a certain height, above which the displacement profile over multiple longwall panels become nearly flat. Increasing panel width and extraction height lead to a greater extent of the fractured zone and a larger magnitude of surface subsidence. An extraction height of more than 7 m may breach the thick aquifer. Stress concentration on the wide pillar can undergo up to 5 times increase in the in-situ stress, posing high risks of coal burst. Adjusting mining parameters such as panel width and extraction height can facilitate an effective strategy to minimize water inrush and coal burst risks in such a mining condition.

The deformation and movement characteristics of high-level key stratums in overlying strata are important for estimating ground subsidence and understanding failure characteristics of ultrathick strata during mining. In this study, a distributed optical fiber sensor (DOFS) and multipoint borehole extensometers (MPBXs) were collaboratively employed to monitor the deformation of high-level key stratums in situ during the mining process at working face 130,604 of the Maiduoshan Coal Mine. DOFS monitoring results showed that the distance from advance influence of mining on the ground surface is 219.2 m. The deformation of the shallow stratums were greater and was affected earlier than that of the deep stratums. The deformation in the strata did not occur continuously and the boundary curve of the impact from advance mining was not a straight line with the advancement of the working face. By the MPBX technology, we measured the strata movement and obtained four-stage characteristics of high-level key stratum movement. The subsidence of the primary key stratum and the sub key stratum were monitored to reach 1389 and 1437 mm; their final relative displacement differed by 48 mm. No bed separation was observed in between the strata, and the key stratums tended to sink as a whole with the advancement of the working face. This research guides the analysis the movement of thick high-level key stratums.

When there are multiple key strata in the overburden of a deep coal seam and the surface subsidence coefficient after mining is small, this indicates that the overlying key strata fail to break completely after mining. On this occasion, stress is easily concentrated in the working face, which in turn leads to the occurrence of dynamic disasters such as rock bursts. This study adopted a comprehensive analysis method of field monitoring and numerical simulations to explore the influence of the key stratum on the evolution law of mining-induced stress in the working face. A distributed optical fiber sensor (DOFS) and a surface subsidence GNSS monitoring system were arranged inside and at the mouth of the ground observation borehole, respectively. According to the monitoring results of strain obtained from the DOFS, the height of the broken stratum inside the overlying strata was obtained and according to the monitoring results of surface subsidence, the surface subsidence coefficient was proven to be less than 0.1, indicating that the high key stratum is not broken completely, but enters a state of bending subsidence instead. In order to reveal the influence of the key stratum on the mining-induced stress of the working face, two 3DEC numerical models with and without the key stratum were established for a comparative analysis. As the numerical simulation results show, when there are multiple key strata in the overburden, the stress influence range and the stress concentration coefficient of the coal seam after mining are relatively large. The study revealed the working mechanism of rock burst accidents after large-scale mining and predicted the potential area with a rock burst risk after mining of the working face, which was verified by field investigations. The research results are of great guiding significance for the identification of the working mechanism of rock bursts in deep mining condition and for their prevention and control.

Longwall pier-column backfilling is a partial backfilling technique initially designed in thin coal seam mines. With the increase of mining intensity, the mining height and width of the backfilling working face will also increase. It is necessary to analyze how changes in working face dimensions influence the control effect of overburden subsidence in pier-column backfilling. In this study, a mining model with a combination of 25 conditions (five different mining heights (1~3 m) × five different mining widths (80~240 m)) was designed using a FLAC3D (Vision 5.0) numerical simulation. The simulation was used to analyze the control effect of overburden subsidence with varying mining heights and widths. In addition, according to the field working face conditions, two physical similarity models were performed to explore the overburden subsidence law in pier-column backfilling with different mining heights and widths. It was observed from the above study that mining heights and widths will have a different influence on the overburden subsidence in longwall pier-column backfilling. The result of this study provides strong theoretical support for evaluating the control effect of overburden subsidence in longwall pier-column backfilling.

Existing studies mostly focus on the stress change of coal in front of a goaf, but rarely conduct field monitoring on the internal pressure of a goaf, primarily due to the complex environment and other restrictive conditions of goafs. This paper first used physical simulation to monitor and analyze the internal pressure of goaf and found that goaf pressure presented a stepwise growth with the key stratum breaking. In addition, field measurements were conducted to monitor the goaf pressures of two different working faces. Goaf pressures both presented linear growth with the advance of the working face. According to comparative analysis, there were some differences between the two monitoring methods in terms of the corresponding relationship. This reflects that in the actual rock mass, after the breaking of a key stratum, the loads of the strata under its control are not transferred to the goaf instantaneously and load transfer characteristics are probably related to roof separation distribution characteristics of overlying strata, the bulking characteristics of caved rock mass, lateral stress limitation and other factors. The results of this study will offer some guidance for studies on the movement laws of overlying strata and the load transfer of overlying strata above goafs.