Engineering and Mining Journal - Whether the market is copper, gold, nickel, iron ore, lead/zinc, PGM, diamonds or other commodities, E&MJ takes the lead in projecting trends, following development and reporting on the most efficient operating pr
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SLOPE STABILITY OCTOBER 2017 • E&MJ; 49 www.e-mj.com establish baseline elevation. "We can build an elevation model from the scans," Pres- ton said. "This will be used mostly in areas of the mine where you don't have a DTM already and you need to quickly start scan- ning and producing alarms." Additionally, a high-definition camera enables the system to "sync the images with the data," he said. ArcSar features an atmospheric correc- tion algorithm that automatically edits out the effects of weather on the speed of the wave and the resulting data. "It analyzes the data over time to build a model of the atmosphere using what it determines are stable areas," Preston said. "It uses these to build an atmospheric model and subtract it out of the data." The model is updated with every scan, he said. The al- gorithm allows the radar to "have longer shots, to shoot through more atmosphere," Preston said. "That gives us a higher reli- ability of the data with less user error." IDS offers the Guardian FPM360 software suite that enables a miner to combine and manipulate radar data from multiple units. "One solution combines radar data, prism displacement and slow movement analysis into a single versatile platform without the need to invest in additional software," the company report- ed. The primary benefit is ease of use, Preston said. "They don't have to go to multiple computers to look at different data sets, he added." The system allows the user to set up to 10 levels of alarms. The software gen- erates text and email alerts. "You can say stuff like if it moves more than a half an inch an hour I want you to not only send me an email, I want you to send the dis- patcher and operations an email saying, 'hey, watch out for this area,'" Preston said. "Or, here's a picture of it until a geo- technical engineer calls you to let you know to go back in there." The company offers a consultation to prospective customers to determine needs and the details of the possible deploy- ment. Upon purchase, IDS sends person- nel to the site to set up the system, a pro- cess that can take up to two days. "Once it is set up, we provide a three-day certifica- tion course where we go through with the users the software and the system, how to set it up and how to start projects and how to effectively alarm," Preston said. "Once we feel comfortable that the users know it, they take the short test and we certify them as users so they can set alarms." The company also offers a support plan that includes software upgrades and patches and 24/7 email and call support. Last month, the company fielded its first order for the system, which will go to a Chilean copper mine, Preston said. That order was followed shortly by one from an American miner. "They are shipping out of Italy this month and next month." Increased Range, Mobility, Versatility Reutech's MSR series of real aperture ra- dar units have been deployed to mines in 26 countries on six continents for one rea- son, "quality," said Jan de Beer, executive manager, Reutech. For example, in one in- stance, quality data from a unit saved lives before the system was even commissioned. At an American mine, "movement was detected on the slope while we were still in the process of completing on-site com- missioning and conducting operator train- ing," de Beer said. "The movement was also detected in the area where personnel were working." The movement was unex- pected, he said, and the data was at first unwanted. Initially, the miner was wary to act. "After long discussions with the resi- dent geotechnical engineer, they decided to warn operations and to clear the area," de Beer said. "They instructed a brand new hydraulic shovel to move away from the area." Almost immediately after it ex- ited, the collapse occurred. "You could see that the tracks of the shovel were covered by material as it came down the slope," he said. "It was a very close call." And it was a call that could be made from a distance of almost 2.5 miles. The most powerful MSR unit can scan from a distance of 4,000 m, and it can scan fast. "With a maximum scan speed of 40° per second, the MSR Modular Series covers broad areas in only a few minutes," the company reported. That speed is the fastest on the market for real aperture radars, de Beer said. The scan speed and other func- tionalities enable the unit to be deployed in both critical and wide-area monitoring. Thus, the versatility of the series may be its foremost selling point, de Beer said. For example, he said, a unit can be configured to be either mobile or station- The Reutech MSR real aperture radar features an integrated Leica Geosystems total station to enable auto-georeferenc- ing. Above, a mobile MSR unit. (Photo: Reutech)