Mine

mine, in warfare

mine, in warfare, term formerly applied to a system of tunnels dug under an army fortification and ending in a chamber where either explosives were placed to be detonated at the chosen moment or the supports were burned, causing the mine and the wall above it to collapse. Modern mines are encased explosives detonated by contact, magnetic proximity, or electrical impulse.

Land mines, equipped with pressure sensors slightly above or below ground, came into wide use in World War II, particularly in N Africa and Russia and on the Western front. They are of two general types—antipersonnel and antitank; the latter are designed so that lighter objects will not cause them to explode. Mines can now be manufactured to contain an internal clock that deactivates them after a set time period; they are referred to as "smart" mines. Mines whose detonation deactivation is not set are called "dumb" or persistent mines. To prevent magnetic detection, modern land mines have often been encased in plastic rather than metal.

No completely safe way of removing land mines is known. In World War II the United States and Great Britain developed several types of mine-detecting and mine-exploding equipment, but they proved inadequate. Despite technological advances, identification still usually requires an inch by inch probbing of the ground, which carries great risk and cost.

According to UN figures there are approximately 100 million mines laid across the world, with more than twice that amount in stockpiles. Angola is estimated to have 15 million mines; Cambodia, 10 million (which translates to one per citizen); Afghanistan, 10 million; and Bosnia and Croatia, 3 million each. It is most often the world's civilian populations that are injured (20,000 annually) or killed (10,000).

In 1997 an international treaty, now ratified by more than 135 nations, called for signatory nations to end the use, development, acquisition, and stockpiling of land mines and to destroy their current stocks of such mines; the treaty went into effect in 1999. The United States has refused to sign the treaty, arguing that doing so would hinder the country's ability to protect its troops; Russia and China also have not signed. The International Campaign to Ban Landmines, a coalition of more that 1,000 organizations, won the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize for its efforts to bring about the signing of the treaty. In 2004 the U.S. government announced that it would end the use of persistent land mines by 2010 (and before then outside the Korean peninsula).

Naval mines of various types have been used periodically since the 16th cent., but it was not until World War I that they entered into wide use. Modern naval mines, equipped with sonar or magnetic sensors, are laid on the surface of the sea or sometimes anchored below. They fall within two broad classifications—automatic and controlled. The automatic mine, once planted and armed, is activated by the presence of a ship; it is incapable of discriminating between friendly and enemy ships. The controlled mine, in contrast, is connected by electric cable to a shore station and can be disarmed to allow the passage of friendly vessels. For defensive purposes, mines are often placed in secretly charted locations near protected harbors by specially equipped vessels known as minelayers. As an offensive weapon, mines are placed in or near enemy harbors, generally by aircraft or submarine.

Minesweepers are employed as a countermeasure, often with wooden hulls to avoid magnetic mines. Helicopters can explode mines by towing sweeping equipment while traveling at a safe distance above the water. Minesweeping is vital both during and after a conflict, as thousands of active mines may still be floating in shipping lanes. As recently as the mid-1990s naval mines were discovered in the seabed off a popular beach in Malta; they had been laid by the British during World War II to sink German vessels.

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mine, in industry

mine, in industry: see mining.

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mine

Zoology a groove or tunnel made by certain insects, esp in a leaf

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mine [mīn]

(mining engineering)

An opening or excavation in the earth for extracting minerals.

(ordnance)

An encased explosive or chemical charge designed to be positioned so that it detonates when the target touches or moves near it or when it is fired by remote control; general types are land mines and underwater mines.

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Mine 

(1) Ammunition for firing from mortars and smoothbore recoilless guns. Various types of such shells include fragmentation, high-explosive fragmentation, and high-explosive shells, which are designed to destroy enemy manpower and weapons or defensive structures; incendiary, smoke, illuminating, and leaflet shells, which are used to perform auxiliary combat missions; and training shells. The unit of fire for smooth-bore recoilless guns includes shaped-charge (antitank) shells and high-explosive fragmentation shells. The loaded shell consists of a body (steel or refined cast iron) with a charge of explosives, primary and supplementary propellant powder charges, a fuse, and a stabilizer. On the body of the shell there is a cylindrical part, and there are ribs on the vanes of the stabilizer to ensure centering and correct movement of the shell along the barrel. The stabilizer (which is steel or aluminum) gives the shell stability in flight.

(2) A combat means for setting up explosive obstacles that are used to inflict losses on the enemy, inhibit his advance, and make the waging of combat more difficult. There are naval mines and land mines.

(3) An obsolete term in fortifications for “tunnel.”

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Mine 

an enterprise designed mainly for the underground mining of ores, rocks bearing chemical elements, and construction materials. A mine may be composed of several adjacent shafts with independent openings and separate ventilation systems for the underground excavations. There may be common surface equipment and auxiliary plants, such as crushing and sorting plants, concentration plants, electromechanical and repair shops, warehouses, and maintenance installations. Enterprises engaged in the open-pit mining of ore are sometimes called mines, as in the case of the Magnitogorsk Mine. The type of mining operations carried out depends on the excavation system adopted.

Mines with high output capability provide the best return for capital investment. In the USSR, for example, more than half the underground mining of iron ore is concentrated at nine of the country’s 37 mines, with annual output reaching more than 3 million tons. The annual production capacity of the S. M. Kirov Apatite Mine in the Khibiny Mountains is 7 million tons. The annual production of the F. E. Dzerzhinskii Mine in the Krivoi Rog Iron Ore Basin is 12.1 million tons; this figure includes the 7 million tons mined annually in the Gigant Shaft. As of 1973, the First Soligorsk Potassium Mine produced 11 million tons annually. The normal depreciation period for mines in the USSR when veins are being worked varies from eight to ten years but may reach 25–40 years or more for large deposits.

Outside the Soviet Union and the socialist countries, there were in 1970 more than 180 mines with annual production of greater than 1 million tons; of these, 34 mines produced more than 3 million tons annually. The largest mine is the Kiruna Iron Mine in Sweden, which in 1973 produced 27 million tons.

In the USSR, mining excavations are up to 1 km deep at the V. I. Lenin Mine in the Krivoi Rog Iron Ore Basin (iron ores) and at the Oktiabr’skii Mine in Noril’sk (complex ores). Gold is mined at depths of greater than 3 km in India and the Republic of South Africa.

M. D. FUGZAN

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Mine 

(Russian, fugas), an explosive charge housed in a waterproof casing and placed just below the surface of the ground or water. Detonated with a clockwork fuze—either electrically or by a flame—or with a mechanical pressure-firing device, mines explode without warning, inflicting losses on the enemy and hindering his advance. Such weapons are used in military obstacles.