Investigation of Discrete Fracture Network on Geometrical Characteristics of Fractured Rock Mass in Underground Mine

The discrete fracture network (DFN) approach is used to develop a rock mass model filled with rock mass discontinuities, which is necessary to provide fundamental understanding of complicated rock masses and the ability to upscale analyses. DFN models have proven to be an efficient and accurate method to analyse behaviour of fractured rock mass enabling estimations of block stability, hydraulic properties and hydro-mechanical coupling. This paper focuses on the development of a DFN model with emphasis on identification of rock mass parameters. Discussion of the important rock mass characteristics necessary for DFN modeling is presented, along with the analysis of rock mass discontinuity geometrical characteristics from laser scanning method in an underground mine including orientation, discontinuity sets, trace length and discontinuity intensity. This data is then used to produce a representative probability density function of the analysed rock mass discontinuities. The rock mass is then modelled in FracMan.