FALLOWFIELD TOWNSHIP -- Having been blocked by the state from mining one panel of coal, Maple Creek Mining is moving on to another.
Thus, longwall mining could resume in Fallowfield Township this spring.
The company laid off 500 miners Nov. 13 after the state Department of Environmental Protection ordered cessation of longwall mining in an area beneath a tributary of Maple Creek, saying it would result in a loss of water flow to the stream.
In December, Environmental Hearing Board Administrative Law Judge Bernard A. Labuskes Jr. denied Maple Creek's request for an injunction that would have allowed mining to resume in Panel 6 East pending the company's appeal of the DEP order.
A hearing on the DEP order will be held at a future date.
Shortly after Labuskes denied the injunction, Maple Creek started recalling workers to begin preparations for longwall mining at Panel 9 East.
Most of the workers have returned to the job, said Mike Gardner, associate chief counsel for Maple Creek Mining.
Gardner said the company will likely begin longwall mining Panel 9 East within the next one to two months.
State Department of Environmental Protection spokesman Tom Rathbun said the stream in Panel 9 East is intermittent. The stream in Panel 6 East is perennial.
There are two forms of coal mining.
In the room and pillar method, rooms are cut into the coal bed, leaving a series of pillars -- or columns -- of coal to help support the mine roof and control air flow.
Longwall mining involves total extraction of the coal. Such walls are not left behind.
Maple Creek Mining has conducted longwall mining in the township since fall 2003. It originally planned to mine 2,130 acres through 2008. But Gardner could not estimate how long mining will be conducted.
He said the company originally planned to room and pillar mine a section west of Panel 9 through 12. But he said that plan could be shelved because of "low production out of the mining units."
State Act 54 of 1994 allows coal companies to mine beneath homes and other structures built before 1966, as long as property owners are compensated for subsidence damage and water loss.
Several homeowners have already experienced mine subsidence damage to their homes. Garnder said the company is proceeding with payments to homeowners whose dwellings are damaged by mine subsidence due to longwall mining.
