Jurisdiction: Abandoned Mine Lands
1997 Completed Projects Archive
Beulah/Zap Project
The Beulah/Zap Site (107kb pdf) is located approximately 75 miles north of Bismarck in west central North Dakota. Several underground lignite coal mines were operated near the cities of Beulah and Zap from the early 1900s until about 1955. Knife River Coal Mining Company (182kb pdf) operated the largest of these and it undermined an area of over 1000 acres directly north and east of Beulah. Coal seams in this area are relatively thick with a shallow cover of overburden. As the underground mines have begun to deteriorate with time, cave-ins have been occurring which result in large and deep sinkholes.
In the past several years, deep sinkholes have been surfacing in residential and commercial areas and on public roads near Beulah and Zap. Some of these sinkholes have been over 30 feet deep. In 1995-97, the Abandoned Mine Lands (AML) Division conducted exploratory drilling which confirmed the presence of collapsing underground mines beneath Manny's Sports Center, a large multi-purpose commercial building, and several nearby occupied mobile homes. The Manny's complex includes the Black Diamond Lounge and the Hook, Line and Sinker convenience store and bait shop, which are all located in the same building.
Between July 14 and August 22, 1997, the AML Division conducted a pressurized grout remote backfilling project to stabilize the underground mines beneath the Manny's complex from collapse. In this technique, a cementitious grout is pumped through drilled holes directly into collapsing underground mine workings. This project was interesting because grout was pumped into holes drilled into mined workings directly through the floor of the building. Grout was also pumped through angled holes that intercepted mined workings directly beneath the building. Several specialized monitoring techniques were utilized to alert contractors if structural movement occurred during pressure grouting activities beneath the building.
The contractors for this project were The Concrete Doctor, Inc., (TCDI) http://www.geomod.com/ of Lincolnshire, IL, and Geoserv, Inc., of Bismarck. Approximately 6750 cubic yards of grout were pumped into the underground mine workings and total contract costs were about $450,000. This AML project was the subject of a paper presented at the 19th Annual Conference of the Association of Abandoned Mine Land Programs at Canaan Valley West Virginia, August 17-20, 1997. Several other commercial, residential and transportation facilities in the Beulah/Zap area are undermined and at risk of collapse. Therefore, additional reclamation work is planned for 1998 and subsequent years at Beulah and Zap.
- Pre-reclamation photo of Manny's and adjacent homes (123kb pdf)
- Pre-reclamation photo of the Hook, Line and Sinker (149kb pdf)
- Subsidence beneath the Black Diamond Lounge, 1993 (153kb pdf)
- Exploratory drilling, Winter 1996 (159kb pdf)
- Angled drilling (158kb pdf)
- Drilling inside the building (165kb pdf)
- Installing casing in a drilled hole (160kb pdf)
- Grout pumping operations (171kb pdf)
- Grout pressure gauge (159kb pdf)
- Grout testing (157kb pdf)
- Grout pumping inside the building (158kb pdf)
- A "blowout" (184kb pdf)
- Ground cracking caused by grout pumping (173kb pdf)
- Monitoring equipment (146kb pdf)
- Monitoring equipment (2) (166kb pdf)
Columbus (3) Project
The Columbus Phase 3 AML Site is located approximately 4 miles south and 1 mile west of Columbus, North Dakota. The project site is within the S ½ of Section 24, T162N, R94W in Burke County. This project site contains 45 acres of an approximately 1280 acre surface mine. The project entailed the elimination of 4000 feet of dangerous highwall left at the old Truax–Traer surface coal mine. Reclamation work on this site started on May 12, 1997. Project Manager and Engineer for the project was Mark Knell. The Gary Morlock Construction Contractor moved approximately 367,600 cubic yards of soil material to eliminate the hazardous highwalls from a 45 acre area. The contractor utilized a fleet of construction equipment, which included scrapers, dozers, motorgader, excavator and end-dumb trucks. A diversion ditch was constructed to control water and prevent erosional problems. Topsoil material was salvaged prior to spoil dirt work operations then respread following completion of the dirt work. On August 18, 1997 the dirt work at the Columbus Phase 3 project was completed. The project area was fertilized, seeded and mulched during September 1997. The project was inspected by Ken Tokach. The project was completed for $325,474.50. Trees will be planted on the site next spring. The attached photographs show a small portion of the reclamation area:
- Columbus 3 Photo 1 (486kb pdf)
- Columbus 3 Photo 2 (131kb pdf)
