Editing Longwall mining (section)

==Automation==
Longwall mining has traditionally been a manual process in which alignment of the face equipment was done with string lines. Technologies have been developed which automate several aspects of the longwall mining operation, including a system that aligns the face of the retreating longwall panel perpendicularly to the gate-roads.

Briefly, [[inertial navigation system]] outputs are used in a [[dead reckoning]] calculation to estimate the shearer positions. Optimal [[Kalman filter]]s and smoothers can be applied to improve the dead reckoning estimates prior to repositioning the longwall equipment at the completion of each shear.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Einicke | first1 =  G.A. | last2 = Ralston | first2 = J.C. | last3 = Hargrave | first3 = C.O. | last4 = Reid | first4 = D.C. | last5 = Hainsworth | first5 = D.W. | title = Longwall Mining Automation. An Application of Minimum-Variance Smoothing | journal = IEEE Control Systems Magazine | volume = 28 | issue = 6 |pages=28–37 |doi=10.1109/MCS.2008.929281 | date=December 2008 | s2cid = 36072082 }}</ref> [[Expectation-maximization algorithm]]s can be used to estimate the unknown filter and smoother parameters for tracking the longwall shearer positions.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Einicke | first1 =  G.A. | last2 = Malos | first2 = J.T. | last3 = Reid | first3 = D.C. | last4 = Hainsworth | first4 = D.W. | title = Riccati Equation and EM Algorithm Convergence for Inertial Navigation Alignment | journal = IEEE Trans. Signal Process. | volume = 57 | issue = 1 | pages = 2904–2908 | date=January 2009 | doi = 10.1109/TSP.2008.2007090 | bibcode = 2009ITSP...57..370E | s2cid = 1930004 }}</ref>

Compared to manual control of the mine equipment, the automated system yields improved production rates. In addition to productivity gains, automating longwall equipment leads to safety benefits. The coal face is a hazardous area because methane and carbon monoxide are present, while the area is hot and humid since water is sprayed over the face to minimize the likelihood of sparks occurring when the shearer picks strike rock. By automating manual processes, face workers can be removed from these hazardous areas.{{Citation needed|reason=There is no citation|date=January 2019}}