A key lever for digitalization in underground mining is securing mine-wide, robust and resilient broadband wireless connectivity. The nature of underground mining is that digital infrastructure must operate and be maintained in a harsh, often unforgiving environments.
Whilst legacy fibre installations are established and commonplace these are generally terminated with a network switch at level access or waiting places with limited connectivity up to the working face, known as the “last-mile”. Reliance on well-designed wireless infrastructure with high up time availability are critical to connecting workers and assets on mine site.
Dwarsrivier North Shaft is in a remote area where established connectivity on surface can be a challenge. To deliver on digitalisation objectives and encouraging technology experimentation by the executive team an end-to-end connectivity solution was required to connect their trackless mobile machinery (TMM) equipment.
Operating a mixed fleet of underground TMM equipment and in a pursuit to aggregate equipment data and insights, connectivity was required right up to the blast face. This includes collecting vehicle telemetry data whilst in the panel which can trigger certain alarms with preset thresholds for short interval control.
