THE BASIC MECHANISMS IN ROCK BLASTING

THE SHOCK WAVE AND INITIAL FRAGMENTATION PROCESSES IN CONDENSED MATTER, SURROUNDING A DETONATING CHARGE, HAVE BEEN INVESTIGATED. RESULTS OF MODEL BLASTINGS IN PLEXIGLASS, EXPERIMENTS IN ROCK, AND COMPUTER CALCULATIONS ARE PRESENTED. THE BASIC DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CRATER BLASTING AND BENCH BLASTING IS ILLUSTRATED. /AUTHOR/