GroundProbe Hosts 4th Workshop on Management of Geotechnical Risks
GroundProbe, in conjunction with SRK Consulting and Maccaferri, conducted the 4th workshop on Management of Geotechnical Risks, at Hermosillo, Mexico, on Friday.
This event was GroundProbe’s highest attended North American workshop to date with 45 industry persons in attendance across a wide array of roles and position; including Mine Managers, Technical Service Managers, and Geotechnical Engineers, from 11 separate mining groups.
The event saw each of the organisations present on the topic of managing geotechnical risks through their own companies’ experiences; SRK through their involvement in mining industry consulting, GroundProbe with regard to monitoring solutions which help manage geotechnical risks, and Maccaferri through control systems.
Víctor Salcido, from SRK Consulting, opened the event by discussing the increasing importance of proper planning and management of geotechnical risks, both before and after a risk has been identified.
The opening remarks were followed up by Civil Engineer and Master in Rock Mechanics Fredy Henríquez, from SRK Consulting, who discussed new ways of thinking in terms of mine development with specific focus on risk analysis concepts as well as probabilistic analysis.
Mr Henríquez also expressed his desire to cultivate a “geotechnical community” where people and companies share their knowledge of geotechnical risks.
GroundProbe’s Group Geotechnical Sales Specialist, Albert Cabrejo, then spoke about the different monitoring solutions and technologies developed by GroundProbe in order to locate and assess geotechnical risks in real-time in both open-pit and underground mines. Mr Cabrejo went on to discuss further strategies often implemented in order to enable optimum risk management.
Finally, Civil Engineer and Master in Geotechnics Melissa Miuzzi , from Maccaferri, concluded the event by discussing their mesh device coating systems, which have been developed to control risk and optimise the design of open-pit mines.
The event concluded with a lively roundtable discussion involving all the attendees and presenters.
“GroundProbe is looking forward to further collaboration with other forward-thinking companies involved in the Mexican mining industry, especially those companies with new and innovative ideas regarding geotechnical risk management,” said Chris Bijsterveld, GroundProbe’s Business Manager for North America.
“Moving forward, we are excited to bring the latest geotechnical monitoring solutions being developed by GroundProbe into the Mexican mining industry and integrating them as best practice in order to ensure maximum safety and productivity.”