During the last decade, caving mining has become one of the most research intensive areas of mining engineering. This is driven by the need to reduce the risk associated with these methods. Risk reductions will be achieved by better understanding the behaviour of in situ rock mass, the stresses, the natural fragmentation process, the material flow and draw control. These are major themes of this symposium and the proceedings contain the state-of-the-art research results in these areas. The benefits of this research will be realised by bringing this new knowledge from researchers to mine operators so it can be included in the design and planning of caving mines.
Caving 2010 attracted excellent international participation, with contributions from 11 countries.
The proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Block and Sublevel Caving feature 50 high calibre papers that were presented at Caving 2010 held in Perth, Western Australia, 20-22 April 2010.