| One of the greatest concerns in designing a rock blasting operation is to control the depth of blast-induced damage into the rock mass. The extent of damage, also called backbreak or dilution, should be controlled so that all the rock needed could be excavated while keeping the surrounding rocks as intact and stable as possible.; The purpose of this research is to develop a computer program in predicting the extent of damage from the blast-induced vibration. The program, based on an engineering approach, is aimed to be easy to use and efficient, so that a reasonable analysis can be done in minutes. In this research an established damage model, based on the correlation between intensity of blast-induced vibrations and the extent of damage in rock, has been further modified to include realistic field design parameters. These parameters are calibrated by comparing the model predictions against well-documented case studies.*; *This dissertation is a compound document (contains both a paper copy and a CD as part of the dissertation). The CD requires the following system requirements: Microsoft Office; Micrsoft Paint. |
