Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Estimating extent and properties of blast-damaged zone around underground excavations

2015; SciELO; Volume: 68; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1590/0370-44672015680062

1807-0353

Slavko Torbica, Veljko Lapčević,

Geophysical Methods and Applications

A common technique in hard rock tunneling, and underground excavation in general, is drilling and blasting. This method of excavation assumes that damage will be done to the surrounding rock mass depending on its quality. Herein is a proposal for how to estimate blast-damaged zone extent and shape, and how to quantify rock mass properties in this zone. Comparison was made, using FEM, between models with and without blast-damaged zone consideration through analyzing its impact on the support load. Results showed greater support loads in the case of blast-damaged zone modeling. Also, comparison was made between the proposed method for blastdamaged zone quantification and quantification using blast damage factor D. Results showed that in both cases, the support loads are in same magnitude order. In other words, compared to the blast damage factor D method, the proposed is more objective and makes it possible to describe the blasting process before it is actually done.