Natural Resources Research ( 2019)

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11053-019-09461-0

Original Paper

Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit

Mine: Assessment of Different Artificial Intelligence
Techniques

Xuan-Nam Bui ,1,2,7 Hoang Nguyen ,1,2,7 Hai-An Le,3 Hoang-Bac Bui,4,5
and Ngoc-Hoan Do1,6

Received 18 November 2018; accepted 19 January 2019

Air over-pressure (AOp) is one of the products of blasting operations for rock fragmentation
in open-pit mines. It can cause structural vibration, smash glass doors, adversely affect the
surrounding environment, and even be fatal to humans. To assess its dangerous effects, seven
artificial intelligence (AI) methods for predicting specific blast-induced AOp have been
applied and compared in this study. The seven methods include random forest, support
vector regression, Gaussian process, Bayesian additive regression trees, boosted regression
trees, k-nearest neighbors, and artificial neural network (ANN). An empirical technique was
also used to compare with AI models. The degree of complexity and the performance of the
models were compared with each other to find the optimal model for predicting blast-
induced AOp. The Deo Nai open-pit coal mine (Vietnam) was selected as a case study
where 113 blasting events have been recorded. Indicators used for evaluating model per-
formances include the root-mean-square error (RMSE), determination coefficient (R2), and
mean absolute error (MAE). The results indicate that AI techniques provide better per-
formance than the empirical method. Although the relevance of the empirical approach was
acceptable (R2 = 0.930) in this study, its error (RMSE = 7.514) is highly significant to
guarantee the safety of the surrounding environment. In contrast, the AI models offer much
higher accuracies. Of the seven AI models, ANN was the most dominant model based on
RMSE, R2, and MAE. This study demonstrated that AI techniques are excellent for pre-
dicting blast-induced AOp in open-pit mines. These techniques are useful for blasters and
managers in controlling undesirable effects of blasting operations on the surrounding
environment.
KEY WORDS: Mining environment, Air over-pressure, Blasting, Artificial intelligence, Open-pit mine.

5
1 Center for Excellence in Analysis and Experiment, Hanoi
Department of Surface Mining, Mining Faculty, Hanoi Univer-
University of Mining and Geology, 18 Vien Street, Duc Thang
sity of Mining and Geology, 18 Vien Street, Duc Thang Ward,
ward, Bac Tu Liem District, Hanoi, Vietnam.
Bac Tu Liem District, Hanoi, Vietnam. 6
2 Faculty of Mining, Saint-Petersburg Mining University, Saint-
Center for Mining, Electro-Mechanical research, Hanoi Univer-
Petersburg, Russia.
sity of Mining and Geology, 18 Vien Street, Duc Thang ward, 7
To whom correspondence should be addressed; e-mail:
Bac Tu Liem District, Hanoi, Vietnam.
3 nguyenhoang@humg.edu.vn
Faculty of Oil and Gas, Hanoi University of Mining and Geol-
ogy, 18 Vien Street, Duc Thang ward, Bac Tu Liem District,
Hanoi, Vietnam.
4
Faculty of Geosciences and Geoengineering, Hanoi University of
Mining and Geology, 18 Vien Street, Duc Thang ward, Bac Tu
Liem District, Hanoi, Vietnam.

 2019 International Association for Mathematical Geosciences

 X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do

AOp (Segarra et al. 2010; Armaghani et al. 2015b).

INTRODUCTION
Therefore, empirical formulas often provide pre-
dicted results with low accuracy (Sawmliana et al.
Mining projects, especially their blasting oper-
2007; Khandelwal and Kankar 2011; Mohamad et al.
ations, often have significant impacts on the sur-
2012; Hajihassani et al. 2014; Armaghani et al.
rounding environment (Shields 1998; Michieka 2014;
2015a).
Shokri et al. 2016; Hresc et al. 2018). According to
To overcome the disadvantages of the methods
previous researchers, not all the energy released
mentioned above, artificial intelligence (AI) has
from blasting is involved in the fragmentation of
been applied in recent years to reduce the undesir-
rock. Researchers have shown that 80–85% of the
able effects caused by blasting operations (Iphar
total amount of explosive energy is wasted and that
et al. 2008; Nguyen et al. 2018a). In this respect,
it creates specific undesirable environmental effects
Mohamed (2011) successfully developed fuzzy logic
such as ground vibration, flyrock, air over-pressure
(FS) and artificial neural network (ANN) using 162
(AOp) and back-break (Khandelwal and Singh
blasting events for predicting blast-induced AOp in
2005; Verma and Singh 2011; Monjezi et al. 2012;
Assay Cement Company. Their study showed that
Hasanipanah et al. 2018). Among those side effects,
the FS model performed better than the ANN
AOp is considered to be the most harmful as it
model. Using a similar approach, Khandelwal and
causes structural vibration, smashes glass doors, af-
Kankar (2011) employed the support vector ma-
fects the surrounding environment and is even fatal
chine (SVM) algorithm to predict blast-induced
to humans (Bowen et al. 1968; Mayorga 1997; Raina
AOp in three limestone mines with 75 blasting
et al. 2004; Chafi et al. 2010; Armaghani et al.
events. Hajihassani et al. (2014) developed a new
2016b). Therefore, predicting blast-induced AOp is
hybrid model based on ANN and particle swarm
needed for reducing its undesirable effects on the
optimization (PSO) algorithm, i.e., PSO-ANN, for
surrounding environment.
predicting blast-induced AOp in four quartiles of
Specific straightforward methods of minimizing
Malaysia using 62 blasting events and yielded a
the impacts of blast-induced AOp on the surround-
promising result. Hasanipanah et al. (2016) investi-
ing environment increase safety distances and im-
gated and constructed three nonlinear models for
prove the quality and structure of works (Mayor and
predicting blast-induced AOp, including adaptive
Flanders 1990; Army 1998). Using barriers to mini-
neuro-fuzzy inference systems (ANFIS), FS, and
mize the effects of blast-induced AOp and ground
ANN. For their study, 77 blasting events in the
vibration has been the focus of many studies, and
Miduk Copper Mine (Iran) were used. A practical
proposals have been made to predict the damage to
technique was also employed to compare with these
buildings and to protect structures (Al-Hussaini and
models. Eventually, they found that ANFIS was the
Ahmad 1991; Andersen and Nielsen 2005; Remen-
most superior model. Recently, many scientists have
nikov and Rose 2007). However, these methods are
published their studies on predicting blast-induced
only qualitative and inadequate for controlling blast-
AOp with improved accuracy. Hasanipanah et al.
induced AOp.
(2017) successfully built a hybrid model based on
Many scholars have attempted to study and
PSO and support vector regression (SVR) algo-
propose experimental methods for estimating blast-
rithms, i.e., PSO-SVR. A variety of equation forms
induced AOp (Siskind et al. 1980; Loder 1987;
such as quadratic (Q), linear (L), and radial basis
McKenzie 1990; Hustrulid 1999; Rodrı́guez et al.
(RBF) kernels were applied to the PSO algorithm to
2007; Kuzu et al. 2009; Armaghani et al. 2016a).
optimize the SVR model. Multiple linear regression
However, experimental methods are mainly based
(MLR) was also used for comparison with the PSO-
on the relationship between the explosive charge per
SVR models. As a result, Hasanipanah et al. (2017)
delay/explosive charge capacity (W) and monitoring
found that the PSO-SVR-RBF was the best model in
distance (R). In fact, AOp can be influenced by
their study. In another study with the PSO algo-
many factors. According to Khandelwal and Kankar
rithm, AminShokravi et al. (2018) used three forms
(2011), blast geometry, W, R, and vegetation have an
of functions for PSO, including L, Q, and power (P)
impact on AOp. Siskind et al. (1980) concluded that
functions, to predict AOp. An ANN model was also
W and R are the most influential factors on AOp.
adopted to compare with the PSO algorithm. The
However, other factors such as over-charging, weak
authors revealed that the PSO-L model was the best
strata, and atmospheric conditions can also affect
model for predicting blast-induced AOp in their
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine
Table 1. Several AI techniques and their performance in predicting blast-induced AOp
Reference Technique
Mohamed (2011) FS
Khandelwal and Kankar (2011) SVM
Hajihassani et al. (2014) PSO-ANN
Hasanipanah et al. (2016) ANFIS
Hasanipanah et al. (2017d) PSO-SVR-RBF
AminShokravi et al. (2018) PSO-L
Alel et al. (2018) MSO-Rand-Mut
Mahdiyar et al. (2018) Monte Carlo
Armaghani et al. (2018) GA-ANN
RMSE root-mean-square error, VAF variance account for, MAPE mean absolute percentage error, R2 determination coefficient, CC
coefficient correlation, MSE mean-square error
case study. Alel et al. (2018) also conducted a similar
study using ANNs based on PSO and multi-swarm
optimization (MSO) algorithms for blast-produced
AOp predictions in Hulu Langat Mine, Malaysia,
with 76 blasting events. Their results showed that the
MSO-Rand-Mut model was the best model in their
study. With another approach using AI, Mahdiyar
et al. (2018) successfully developed a Monte Carlo
simulation technique to predict blast-induced AOp
in a quarry in Malaysia. MLR was applied to
establish the equation for Monte Carlo simulation.
They found that MLR was quite suitable for Monte
Carlo simulation in blast-induced AOp. Genetic
algorithm (GA) was also one of the algorithms used
by Armaghani et al. (2018) to optimize the ANN
model for predicting blast-induced AOp. Accord-
ingly, the number of hidden neurons was optimized
by GA to improve the efficiency of the ANN model,
i.e., GA-ANN model. Experimental techniques,
MLR, and the single ANN model were also per-
formed to predict AOp and compared with the GA-
ANN model. Considering testing datasets, they
concluded that GA-ANN was the best model with a
promising result. Similar works can be found at that
paper here (Hasanipanah et al. 2017a, b, c). Several
results of the techniques as mentioned above are
presented in Table 1.
Review of literature showed that many re-
searchers have studied and proposed prediction
models for blast-induced AOp. Those models,
however, are not applicable everywhere because the
impacts of blasting on the environment are different
from country to country (Nateghi et al. 2009).
Moreover, it is challenging to know that which AI
technique is the best for predicting blast-induced
AOp. Therefore, ‘‘trial-and-error’’ procedure is an
Performance
RMSE = 2.71; VAF = 99.95%
MAPE = 2.10; R2 = 0.855
R2 = 0.94
RMSE = 2.329, R2 = 0.954, and VAF = 95.310
RMSE = 0.45; CC = 0.996
MSE = 4.33; R2 = 0.960
RMSE = 2.180; R2 = 0.970; MAPE = 1.73%
RMSE = 3379; R2 = 0.901; VAF = 90.028
RMSE = 0.049; R2 = 0.965; VAF = 96.380
efficient way of finding out the best AI technique for
predicting blast-induced AOp in this study. Seven
different AI techniques were implemented to pre-
dict blast-induced AOp. They include random forest
(RF) representing decision tree algorithms, SVR
representing nonlinear algorithms, Gaussian process
(GP) representing Gaussian group of methods,
Bayesian additive regression trees (BART) repre-
senting Bayesian methods, boosted regression trees
(BRT) serving boosting algorithms, k-nearest
neighbors (KNN) posing for lazy algorithms, and
ANN rendering for neural networks techniques. An
empirical method was also used to estimate AOp,
and its analysis results were compared with those of
the developed AI models.
STUDY AREA AND DATA USED
Study Area
According to the Vietnam National Coal and
Mineral Industries Holding Corporation Limited
(VINACOMIN), there are 30 open-pit coal mines
and 20 underground coal mines in Quang Ninh. The
five largest open-pit coal mines produce 1–3 Mt/yr,
and the seven largest underground coal mines pro-
duce over 2 Mt/yr. (Vinacomin 2010). The Deo Nai
open-pit coal mine is one of the largest open-pit coal
mines. It is located in Cam Pha city, Quang Ninh
province, Vietnam (Fig. 1). The mine covers a total
area of  6 km2 with proven reserves of 42.5 Mt and
produces 2.5 Mt/yr.
The Deo Nai open-pit coal mine is covered by
sedimentary rocks of the Hon Gai Formation (T3n-
rhg) with a Late Triassic age (Fig. 2). The rocks
 X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do

Figure 1. Location and view of the Deo Nai open-pit coal mine, Vietnam.

Figure 2. A simplified geological map of the surrounding area.

comprise different types such as conglomerate, Descriptive Data Statistics

gritstone, sandstone, siltstone, claystone, shale,
and coal seams. In general, these rocks are quite
hard with ProtodiakonovÕs strength indexes (f) of
8–14 (Protodiakonov et al. 1964) and specific
weights (c) of 2.62–2.65 t/m3 (Vinacomin 2015).
Therefore, an effective and high-performing
blasting method is required to break the rocks in
this coal mine.
In this study, 113 blasting events were recorded
from the Deo Nai open-pit coal mine. According to
Singh et al. (2008), the parameters that affect AOp
can be divided into two groups, namely controllable
and uncontrollable parameters. For controllable
parameters, the settings like W, R, burden (B),
spacing (S), length of stemming (T), powder factor
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine
Figure 3. Instruments used for data collection in this study: (a) GPS for determining monitoring distance; (b)
Kanomax 2212 air quality meter for measurement of air humidity; (c) Blastmate III instrument for collecting AOp
values.
Table 2. General specifications of Blastmate III for AOp
monitoring (source http://www.instantel.com)
Features Parameters
Range 88–148 dB (500 Pa (0.072 PSI) Peak)
Resolution 0.25 Pa (0.0000363 PSI)
Accuracy ± 10% or ± 1 dB, whichever is larger,
between 4 and 125 Hz
Frequency Response 2–250 Hz between  3 dB roll-off points
(P), blast-hole depth, delay times, and blast-hole
diameter can be tuned by blast engineers. For
uncontrollable parameters, such as geological and
geophysical conditions, characteristics of rock mass,
cannot be adjusted by engineers (Khandelwal and
Kankar 2011; Khandelwal and Singh 2013). How-
ever, due to the lacks of information on geological
and geophysical conditions as well as characteristics
of rock mass, uncontrollable parameters were not
often used to predict blast-induced AOp. Also,
Nguyen et al. (2018a) were recommended that air
humidity (RH) should be used as an input variable
for estimating blast-produced AOp. Therefore, se-
ven parameters including W, R, B, S, T, P and RH
were used to predict blast-induced AOp in this
study.
Blasting parameters of the blast pattern were
defined by Hustrulid et al. (2013). P is determined
by rock density, rock hardness, hole diameter, and
average size of rock. B depends on explosive and
borehole parameters such as the mass of charge,
powder factor, bench height, and hole depth. It is
determined to ensure the floor of the surface is flat. S
is one of the parameters of the hole pattern. In this
study, the square hole pattern was used for blasting
operations. Then, S was defined as B factor. The
coefficient of closure can be used to ensure a uni-
form level of fragmentation. T is defined by hole
depth and length of explosive. It must be determined
to be safe and not subject to the ejection of stem-
ming or rifling. Eventually, W was calculated based
on the number of bore-hole and explosive charge
capacity per bore-hole. The AOp values were mea-
sured by Blastmate III instrument from Instantel,
Canada (Fig. 3c), which is highly rated for its data
acquisition and accuracy in regulating AOp (Ta-
ble 2). For monitoring AOp, a microphone was
connected with the Blastmate III device and was
located at AOp monitoring locations. The locations
to be monitored may be behind, in front of or on the
side of the explosion site depending on the actual
conditions. According to recommendations of
Instantel, the microphone should be placed in the
direction of the blast site to ensure the accuracy le-
vel as shown in Figure 4. GPS positioning system
(Fig. 3a) was used to calculate R. RH was measured
by JapanÕs Kanomax 2212 air quality meter
(Fig. 3b), which is designed with a humidity sensor
that can measure accurately in 15 s (Azuma et al.
2018; Fan et al. 2018). The remaining parameters
were collected from 113 blast patterns of the mine
(Fig. 5). Table 3 summarizes the datasets used in
this study.
For each blast pattern of the mine, the hardness
of rock mass was determined before calculating the
parameters of the blast pattern. As mentioned, the
 X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do

Figure 4. Blast-induced AOp monitoring method.

hardness of rock mass in this mine lies in the range

Figure 5. Structure of blast pattern.
of 8–14 according to ProtodiakonovÕs strength index.
Then, the parameters of blast design were defined,
including bench height, diameter of borehole, depth
of borehole, B, S, number of borehole, T, P, and W.
For this mine, the bench height lies in the range of
12–15 m, the depth of borehole lies in the range of
17–18 m. Also, to ensure safety and slope stability,
the bench angle was chosen equal to 70. Based on
the characteristics of the rock mass, the diameter of
the borehole of 250 mm was selected for this mine.

OVERVIEW OF ARTIFICIAL
Table 3. Characteristics of the data used
INTELLIGENCE TECHNIQUES USED
W R B S

Min.: 1171 Min.: 84.8 Min.: 7.400 Min.: 7.400

Random Forest
1st Qu.: 9476 1st Qu.: 336.7 1st Qu.: 7.900 1st Qu.: 7.700
Median: 13,019 Median: 453.1 Median: 8.100 Median: 7.800 RF is one of the ensemble machine learning
Mean: 12,815 Mean: 454.6 Mean: 8.088 Mean: 7.835 algorithms proposed by Breiman (2001). It belongs
3rd Qu. :16,489 3rd Qu.: 588.0 3rd Qu.: 8.300 3rd Qu.: 8.000 to the group of decision trees algorithms and can
Max.: 21,771 Max.: 806.3 Max.: 8.900 Max.: 8.300
solve both classification and regression problems.
T P RH AOp RF involves the construction (growing) of multiple
decision trees via bootstrap aggregation (bagging)
Min.: 5.900 Min.: 0.3300 Min.: 75.00 Min.: 91.13
(Effron and Tibshirani 1993; Breiman 1999). It is
1st Qu.: 6.600 1st Qu.: 0.3900 1st Qu.: 82.00 1st Qu.: 113.93
Median: 6.800 Median: 0.4200 Median: 85.00 Median: 121.09 based on the combination of a set of results from
Mean: 6.851 Mean: 0.4195 Mean: 84.99 Mean: 120.77 many decision trees to make a final decision. Each
3rd Qu.: 7.100 3rd Qu.: 0.4400 3rd Qu.: 88.00 3rd Qu.: 129.14 tree is trained by randomly selecting variables and
Max.: 7.900 Max.: 0.5000 Max.: 96.00 Max.: 143.83 data samples from an initial training dataset. For
predicting blast-induced AOp, RF was applied as
follows:
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine
 The number of trees was determined to en-
sure the richness of the forest;
 Bootstrap with replacement from the original
AOp training dataset. The remaining values,
which were used for validation, are called
out-of-bag (OOB) data;
 For each bootstrap sample, a non-pruning
regression was developed with modifications
at each node;
 At each bootstrap iteration, OOB was used
to predict AOp and averaged from all trees;
 Performance indices (i.e., RMSE, R2, MAE)
were used to evaluate the performance of
predicted AOp values on OOB.
Longjun et al. (2011) also used RF for predict-
ing another problem in blasting operation, i.e.,
ground vibration with satisfactory result. However,
in this study, RF was used for predicting blast-in-
duced AOp.
Support Vector Regression
SVM is a machine learning algorithm based on
the principle of minimizing structural risk to gener-
alize a limited number of samples better and was
proposed by Cortes and Vapnik (1995). Like RF,
SVM can solve both classification and regression
problems. For regression problems, an SVM is called
SVR. SVR relies on a subset of training dataset to
build the forecasting model (Basak et al. 2007).
For predicting blast-induced AOp, SVR can be
performed based on one of the following kernel
functions (Prashanth and Nimaje 2018), thus:
 Linear kernel:
K ðx; yÞ ¼ x  y
 Polynomial kernel:
K ðx; yÞ ¼ ½ðx  yÞ þ 1d ; d ¼ ð1; 2; . . .Þ
 Radial primary kernel function:
kx  yk2
K ðx; yÞ ¼ exp½  ð3Þ
r2
 Two-layer neural kernel:
K ðx; yÞ ¼ tanh½aðx  yÞ  d
Review of literature showed that SVR had been
successfully implemented for blasting problems in
many places (Khandelwal and Kankar 2011; SHI
et al. 2012; Amini et al. 2012; Hasanipanah et al.
2015). In this study, SVR was employed to predict
blast-induced AOp in the Deo Nai open-pit coal
mine using radial primary kernel function (Eq. 3)
and compared with the other AI methods.
Gaussian Process
GP is one of the nonparametric models in AI. It
is a set of random variables and finite elements with
a Gaussian distribution (Rasmussen 2004). GP is
determined based on mean function, h(x), and
covariance function, c(x, x¢). It can be described as:
f ðxÞ  GPðhðxÞ; cðx; x0 ÞÞ ð5Þ
For regression, the GP proceeds to encrypt the
uncertainty before executing the training. After the
relationship between the function and the data is
determined, the Bayes rule is used to update the
beliefs through the function and the posterior dis-
tribution can be computed (Särkkä et al. 2017).
The literature shows that GP has never been
used to predict blast-induced AOp. Hence, its
application for this purpose is investigated and
considered here with the polynomial kernel func-
tion, which is described as:
ðxT x0 þ aÞn
cðx; x0 Þ ¼ ; a  0; n2N
ððk xk2 þaÞðkx0 k2 þaÞÞn=2
ð6Þ
Polynomial kernels without a normalizing
denominator can be determined to produce a finite-
dimensional feature space of polynomials of the to-
ð1Þ tal degree  n ðif a[0Þ(Seeger 2004). The regular-
ization operator for polynomial kernels can be found
in the literature (e.g., Smola et al. 1998; Schreiter
ð2Þ et al. 2016; Chen and Wang 2018).
Bayesian Additive Regression Trees
BART is an algorithm based on the Bayesian
classification and regression tree algorithm proposed
ð4Þ by Chipman et al. (2010). For regression, BART
performs a random sum of decision trees and is
described as:

X
N of supervised learning problems (Altman 1992).
f ðxÞ ¼ DTn ðxÞ; x 2 RP ð7Þ
n¼1
Each regression tree DTn(x) is constructed by
the binary tree structure BTn consisting of topology
and tree splitting rules, and a vector of parameters
related to binary trees BTn (Linero 2018). BART
documentation can be found in Chipman et al.
(2010). BART has been proven to show promising
results in many fields (Hill 2011; Bleich and Kapel-
ner 2014; Bleich et al. 2014). However, it has never
been used to predict blast-induced AOp. Thus, a
BART model was developed in this study for eval-
uating its effectiveness in predicting blast-induced
AOp.
Boosted Regression Trees
BRT is one of the ensemble methods for
improving the accuracy of single models (Elith et al.
2008). It is combined with the advantages of two
algorithms including classification and regression
trees (Trevor et al. 2009) and boosting and was first
introduced by Schapire (2003). It was then widely
developed in the statistical community as an ad-
vanced regression technique (Friedman et al. 2000).
BRT is capable of combining the outstanding
advantages of tree-based methods, handling various
predictive variables and losing data. BRT processes
data without transforming data and ignoring the
outliers. Therefore, it seems to be a powerful tool
for nonlinear issues.
Although the performance of BRT is evident in
various areas (Tyree et al. 2011; Müller et al. 2013),
BRT has never been used to predict the undesirable
effects of blasting operations in the mining field.
Hence, in this study, BRT was used to predict blast-
induced AOp for comparing and evaluating its
effectiveness with the other models.
k-Nearest Neighbors
KNN is one of the most straightforward super-
vised learning algorithms in AI. It was proposed by
Altman (1992) and was classified as lazy machine
learning because it does not learn anything from
training datasets. In KNN, all computations are
conducted to predict the results of new data. KNN
can be applied for classification and regression types
X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do
KNN is also called an instance or memory-based
learning algorithm. In a regression problem, the
output of a data point is equal to that of the nearest
known data point (in the case of k = 1) or is the
weighted average of the production of the closest
locations, or by a relationship based on the distance
to the nearest point. In a nutshell, KNN is an algo-
rithm for finding the output of a new data point
based solely on the information of k data points in
the closest training set (k-neighborhood); it is not
interested in the interferences in the surrounding.
Details of the KNN algorithm can be found in Song
et al. (2017) and Chae et al. (2018).
KNN has not been used to predict blast-induced
AOp in open-pit mines. Therefore, its application is
investigated in this study to predict blast-induced
AOp. Determining the number of neighbors and
setting up the KNN model are discussed in the next
section.
Artificial Neural Network
ANN is an information processing model. It is
based on the activity of the nervous system of an
organism and includes a large number of intercon-
nected neurons that process information. ANN
models act like a human brain. They can learn
through experience (through training), store
knowledge and use it to predict unseen data
(Schalkoff 1997).
The general architecture of an ANN includes
three parts, namely an input layer, hidden layer(s),
and output (Schalkoff 1997) as shown in Figure 6. In
ANN, the number of hidden layers and neurons in
each hidden layer depends on many factors such as
the number of incomes and outcomes of the net-
work, the number of cases in the sample, the noise of
target data, the complexity of the error function,
network architecture, and the network training
algorithm.
At the input layer, the neurons receive biased
(weighted) input information; they then process and
send the information to neurons in the first hidden
layer through a transfer function. These neurons
process and compute the data received from the
input layer and then send the results to the second
hidden layer through a transfer function. A thresh-
old value, instead of a transfer function, is some-
times used to control the output of neurons in a
given layer before the output is moved to the next
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine

considered as training dataset in the first part; the

remaining 20% (16 observations) was viewed as a
testing dataset in the second part.
Performance indices including RMSE, R2, and
MAE were employed to evaluate the performance
of the predictive models on the training and testing
datasets. The three indices are computed as follows:
sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
1X n
RMSE ¼ ðyi  ^ yi Þ 2 ð8Þ
n i¼1

P
Figure 6. General structure of the ANN model for predicting yi Þ 2
ðyi  ^
blast-induced AOp. 2 i
R ¼1 P ð9Þ
yÞ2
ðyi  
i

layer. The process continues until the results are 1X n

passed to the output layer and the final output is MAE ¼ jyi  ^
yi j ð10Þ
n j¼1
provided (Zerguine et al. 2001).
The outcomes of ANN largely depend on the
where n is the total number of data, yi is measured
training process used, which can be one of two types
value, ^yi is predicted value, and 
y is mean of mea-
namely supervised learning and unsupervised
sured values. To evaluate the stability of the models,
learning (Perez et al. 1994). In this study, the
the different between RMSE and MAE was used
supervised learning method was applied based on
(Willmott and Matsuura 2005). In the most optimal
the input data and the requirements of the output
model, R2 should equal to 1, and both RMSE and
data.
MAE should be equal to 0. Also, the lowest value of
ANN has been successfully applied in various
the difference between RMSE and MAE corre-
aspects of the mining field such as air pollution
sponds to the most stable model.
management (Asif et al. 2018), considering content
Of the seven AI techniques used in the study
distributions of impurities in limestone (Koike and
for predicting blast-induced AOp, the Box-Cox
Matsuda 2003), predicting blasting issues (Mohamed
transformation (Sakia 1992) and 10-fold cross-vali-
2009; Monjezi et al. 2013; Hajihassani et al. 2014;
dation (Kohavi 1995) were applied to avoid over-
Bakhtavar et al. 2017), mineral system analysis
fitting or underfitting for the RF, SVR, GP, BART,
(Tessema 2017), and prediction of slope stability
BRT, KNN models. The min–max normalization
(Chakraborty and Goswami 2017). In this study, an
method (Jayalakshmi and Santhakumaran 2011) was
ANN model was developed for predicting blast-in-
applied to avoid overfitting or underfitting for the
duced AOp in the Deo Nai open-pit coal mine. The
ANN models with the scaling in the intervals
results of this model are compared to those of other
[ 1,1].
AI techniques.

Empirical Model
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE MODELS
FOR PREDICTING AOP
To evaluate the effectiveness of forecasting
models, an empirical technique proposed by the
For generating AOp predictive models using
United States Bureau of Mines (USBM) was used to
the seven AI methods, the original data were split
predict AOp in open-cast mine based on the rela-
into two parts. Review of literature showed that the
tionship between R and W, and site factors (Haji-
most commonly used train/test ratio is 80:20, which
hassani et al. 2014; Armaghani et al. 2016b). The
is also referred to as the Pareto principle (Nick
relationship between W and R is determined
2008). The 80:20 is indeed a good starting point
through the SD values, which are calculated as:
according to Swingler (1996). Therefore, 80% of the
whole data (approximately 97 observations) was SD = RW 0:33 ð11Þ

Figure 7. Grid search for optimal RF model in predicting blast-induced AOp.
where R denotes monitoring distance, m; W is
maximum explosive charge capacity, kg; SD is scaled
distance factor (m kg0.33).
From the scaled distance, AOp can be calcu-
lated as follows:
AOp ¼ gðSDÞb
where AOp is measured in dB, g and b are site
factors and computed by regression analysis method.
Depending on the specific conditions of each mine,
site factors are different.
To determine site factors, this study ran a
multivariate regression analysis on the training da-
taset by using SPSS version 18.0 (Carver and Nash
2011). Note that the training dataset used for the
empirical technique is the same as the dataset used
for the seven AI models. The regression analysis
results showed that the empirical model reached its
optimal value with g = 333.384 and b = 0.345.
Hence, the experimental formula for predicting
AOp in this site study is:
AOp ¼ 333:384ðSDÞ0:345
Random Forest
In RF, the two main parameters that determine
the performance of the model are the number of
trees in the forest (ntree) and the number of vari-
ables randomly sampled as candidates at each split
(mtry) (Liaw and Wiener 2002; Nguyen and Bui
X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do
2018). Although the default of ntree was 500 (Brei-
man 2001), this study employed a trial-and-error
procedure with ntree of 500, 1000, 1500, and 2000 to
observe the performance of the RF model. A grid
search technique was applied to define the optimal
value of mtry (Ogutu et al. 2011). The training da-
ð12Þ taset for RF models is the same as those used in the
empirical technique. The results showed that the
optimal RF model on training dataset with ntree =
2000 and mtry = 5 (Fig. 7).
Support Vector Regression
For SVR, r and cost (C) are two parameters
used to control the quality of the AOp predictive
model. The training dataset used to develop the
SVR model includes 97 blasting events, which are
used in the empirical and RF models. The grid
search technique was also utilized to determine the
optimal values for hyper-parameters of SVR with r
in the range of 0–1, and C in the range of 0.25–5.
Finally, an optimal SVR model on training dataset
ð13Þ
was found with r = 0.005 and C = 5. The develop-
ment of the SVR model for predicting blast-induced
AOp in this study is illustrated in Figure 8.
Gaussian Process
With GP, only one parameter, i.e., d, is used to
adjust the modelÕs performance. The same training
dataset (97 blasting events) was used to develop the
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine
Figure 8. Determination of optimal SVR model in predicting blast-induced AOp.
GP model like empirical, RF, and SVR models. The
grid search was also employed to find the optimal
value of d in the range of 0–1. The result shows that
the GP model on training dataset was optimized at
d = 0.02. Figure 9 demonstrates the process of
determining the optimal GP model in this study.
Bayesian Additive Regression Trees
For the BART model, five hyper-parameters
including the number of trees (n), prior boundary
(p), base terminal node hyper-parameter (a), power
terminal node hyper-parameter (x), and degrees of
freedom (nu) were used to control the performance
of the model. It is difficult to know which BART
model is optimal with the values of hyper-parame-
ters. Thus, the grid search technique was again ap-
plied to identify the optimal values of hyper-
parameters in the BART model. The same training
dataset in the empirical, RF, SVR, and GP models
was also used for the development of the BART
model. Accordingly, n parameter was set equal 200
to ensure the abundance of regression trees; p was
searched in the range of 1–10; a was recommended
to default to 0.9, 0.945, or 0.990; x optimal value was
defined in the range of 1–5; and nu parameter was
also found in the range of 1–5 for optimal value. As
a result, the optimal values of hyper-parameters
were reached at n = 200, p = 4, a = 0.945, x = 5 and
nu = 1 (Fig. 10).
Boosted Regression Trees
In the BRT model, three hyper-parameters
including boosting iterations (mstop), max tree
depth (maxdepth), and shrinkage (sh) determine the
performance of the predictive model. Using the
same approach employed in previous models,
training datasets and grid search technique were still
used for searching the optimal BRT model. 10-fold
cross-validation with three repeats was also used for
resampling to improve the accuracy of the model. To
find out the optimal BRT model for predicting blast-
induced AOp, mstop was searched in the range of
50–500, maxdepth in the range of 1–10, and nu in the
range of 0.1–0.5. The search process ends with
mstop = 50, maxdepth = 2 and nu = 0.1, which were
the optimal values for the BRT model in this study.
Figure 11 illustrates the development of the BRT
model for predicting AOp in this study.
 X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do

Figure 9. Search for the optimal value d for the GP model.

Figure 10. Optimal values of hyper-parameters in the BART model.

Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine
Figure 11. Performance of the BRT on the training datasets with various values of the hyper-parameters.
k-Nearest Neighbors
The KNN algorithm only collects results from
neighbors to make its decision. Accordingly, the
number of neighbors (k) is the only factor that
determines the accuracy of the forecasting model. A
grid search technique was established with k set in
the range of 1–50 for building the KNN model. The
same training dataset used in previous models (RF,
SVR, GP, BART, BRT) was also applied to the
development of the KNN model. Finally, a KNN
model with k = 8 was identified as the optimal
model with the smallest RMSE (Fig. 12).
Artificial Neural Network
With ANN, unlike the other AI models (RF,
SVR, GP, BART, BRT, KNN), the performance of
the model was determined by the structure of the
ANN and the training algorithm. In the structure of
the ANN, the numbers of hidden layers and neurons
are the decisive factors for the performance of the
predictive model (Gurney 2014). In theory, an ANN
model with one hidden layer is capable of solving
similar regression problems as those in this study
(Nguyen et al. 2018b). More hidden layers will in-
crease the processing time and the calculation of the
ANN (Nguyen et al. 2018a). According to Easley
et al. (2018), a deep neural network with more than
one hidden layer (multiple hidden layers) is a good
candidate for increasing the accuracy of the model.
Therefore, we developed the ANN models with one,
two, and three hidden layer(s) to test their perfor-
mance. Also, the number of hidden neurons in each
hidden layer should also be designed appropriately.
In some cases, using only a few hidden neurons will
lead to underfitting while using too many hidden
neurons will lead to overfitting (Lu et al. 2017). To
prevent the creation of ANN models that are too
complicated, a trial-and-error procedure with the
number of hidden neurons in each hidden layer was
conducted with the hidden neurons lie in the range
of 5–9. Eight ANN models were established and
their performances were computed based on both
the training and testing datasets (Table 4).
From Table 4, it can be seen that the ANN
models with two and three hidden layers, particu-
larly the ANN 7-9-7-5-1 model, seem to offer better
performance than the ANN models with one hidden
 X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do

Figure 12. Searching the optimal value for the KNN model.

Table 4. ANN models for predicting blast-induced AOp in this RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
study

ANN models Training dataset Testing dataset

In AI, it is difficult to know which model is the
best for predicting blast-induced AOp. Therefore, a
RMSE R2 MAE RMSE R2 MAE ‘‘trial-and-error’’ procedure was performed with the
ANN 7-5-1 1.723 0.975 1.080 3.540 0.942 2.375 seven models mentioned above to evaluate their
ANN 7-7-1 1.875 0.971 1.229 3.400 0.945 2.281 effectiveness in predicting blast-induced AOp. To
ANN 7-9-1 1.725 0.976 1.088 3.485 0.951 2.134 assess the performance of the predictive models, the
ANN 7-7-5-1 1.592 0.979 0.944 3.713 0.928 1.886 testing dataset was used as unseen data for each
ANN 7-5-7-1 1.755 0.975 1.049 2.980 0.950 1.609
model through performance indices, including
ANN 7-9-6-1 1.801 0.973 1.131 2.849 0.951 1.795
ANN 7-9-7-5-1 2.006 0.967 1.365 2.571 0.961 1.697 RMSE, R2, and MAE. Note that the same testing
ANN 7-9-5-7-1 1.739 0.975 1.148 2.854 0.948 1.858 dataset was used for all predictive models. Accord-
ingly, the performance indices of the predictive
The best ANN model was shown in bold
models on the testing dataset are computed in
Table 5.
layer. Based on RMSE, R2, and MAE, it can be Based on Table 5, the empirical technique
concluded that although the ANN 7-9-7-5-1 model provided the poorest performance on the testing
yielded the poorest performance on the training dataset. In contrast, the seven AI techniques appear
dataset, it achieved the best performance on the to be much more efficient. However, closer inspec-
testing dataset. The testing dataset as mentioned tion of Table 5 indicates that R2 of the USBM
above was used as unseen data for evaluating the empirical model was better than those of the BRT
performance of the models. Therefore, the perfor- and KNN models. This shows that the relevance of
mance on the testing dataset was considered as the data with empirical methods might be higher than
performance in practical engineering. Based on with AI techniques in some cases. However, its error
RMSE, R2, and MAE, the ANN 7-9-7-5-1 model was was highly significant to guarantee the safety of the
chosen as the best ANN model for predicting blast- surrounding environment with an RMSE of 7.514.
induced AOp in ANN technique in this study. Fig- Figure 14 shows the relationship between measured
ure 13 illustrates the structure of the selected ANN and predicted values for each of the AI predictive
model in the ANN technique for predicting blast- models based on the testing dataset.
induced AOp.
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine

Figure 13. Construction of the ANN model for predicting blast-induced AOp in this study.

Table 5. Performance indices of predictive models on the training and testing datasets

Model Training datasets Testing datasets

RMSE R2 MAE RMSE R2 MAE RMSE–MAE

Empirical 3.853 0.881 2.501 7.514 0.930 4.585 2.929

RF 1.700 0.972 0.969 2.807 0.943 1.171 1.636
SVR 1.653 0.978 1.090 3.197 0.948 1.847 1.350
GP 2.320 0.973 1.560 2.656 0.949 1.652 1.004
BART 1.796 0.973 1.211 2.704 0.945 1.447 1.257
BRT 1.967 0.969 1.200 3.742 0.898 1.643 2.099
KNN 3.360 0.937 2.578 3.991 0.890 2.596 1.395
ANN 2.006 0.967 1.365 2.571 0.961 1.697 0.874

The best performance was shown in bold type. In which, RMSE representing the root-mean-square error, R2 representing the fitness of the
model, MAE representing mean absolute error, RMSE–MAE representing the stable of the model

Based on Table 5 and Figure 14, it can be seen
that the ANN model performed very well in pre-
dicting blast-induced AOp with an RMSE of 2.571,
R2 of 0.961, and MAE of 1.697 on the testing data-
set. Also, the lowest value of RMSE-MAE of 0.874
on the testing dataset showed that the ANN model
was the most stable model among the models used in
this study. The GP model also performed well in
predicting blast-induced AOp in this study with an
RMSE of 2.656, R2 of 0.949, and MAE of 1.652. The
results indicate that the performance of the GP
model is slightly poorer than that of the ANN
model. However, only one hyper-parameter, i.e., d,
was used to control the performance of the GP
model (Fig. 9). Therefore, the building process of
the GP model was more straightforward than that of
the ANN model. In contrast, Figure 10 shows that
there were five hyper-parameters used to control the
performance of the BART model for predicting
blast-induced AOp in this study. Thus, the building
process of the BART model was more complicated
than those of the ANN and GP models. However,
the BART model yielded an RMSE of 2.704, R2 of
0.945, and MAE of 1.447, implying that its perfor-
mance was poorer than those of the ANN and GP
models. The RF model also performed well in pre-
dicting blast-induced AOp in this study with an
RMSE of 2.807, R2 of 0.943, and MAE of 1.171.
 X.-N. Bui, Nguyen, Le, H.-A. Bui, and Do

Figure 14. Correlation between measured and predicted values of the different AI predictive models based on the testing
dataset.

Accordingly, the performance of the RF model is modelÕs performance (Fig. 7) and ntree recom-
slightly poorer than that of the BART model. The mended for this model was 2000 for higher perfor-
RF model used two hyper-parameters to control the mance in predicting blast-induced AOp. For SVR
Prediction of Blast-induced Air Over-pressure in Open-Pit Mine
Figure 15. The relative importance of various input parameters to AOp.
model, there were two hyper-parameters used to
control the modelÕs performance (Fig. 8). The
building process of the SVR model was simpler than
those of the BART and ANN models. However, the
results in Table 5 show that the performance of the
SVR model was poorer than those of ANN, GP,
BART, and RF models based on the RMSE, R2, and
MAE. The BRT model did not perform well in
predicting blast-induced AOp in this study. Its per-
formance was worse with an RMSE of 3.742, R2 of
0.898, and MAE of 1.643. Furthermore, the building
process of the BRT was complex with three hyper-
parameters used to control the performance of the
model. Among the seven AI predictive models, the
KNN model was the poorest, which yielded the most
mediocre performance with an RMSE of 3.991, R2
of 0.890, and MAE of 2.596.
Review of literature showed that W and R were
the most influential parameters on blast-induced
AOp (Armaghani et al. 2016b; Hasanipanah et al.
2017d). Many studies used these parameters (W, R)
as input variables for predicting blast-induced AOp
(Alel et al. 2018; Armaghani et al. 2018; Faradonbeh
et al. 2018). However, seven input variables namely
W, R, B, S, T, P, and RH were considered in this
study for predicting blast-induced AOp. Therefore,
a procedure for analyzing the degree of influence of
independent variables was performed to identify the
significant factors affecting the quality of the model.
Olden algorithm was applied to define the relative
importance of input variables in ANN. It was pro-
posed by Olden et al. (2004) based on the Garson
algorithm (Garson 1991; Goh 1995). Olden algo-
rithm allows evaluating the contributions of input
variables for the ANN model with multiple hidden
layers. As a result, W, R, and RH were the signifi-
cant factors, which have a significant influence on
the performance of the forecasting model (Fig. 15).
The results show that RH, in addition to W and R,
was also an influence parameter on blast-induced
AOp in practical engineering.
CONCLUSIONS AND REMARKS
Blasting is the most effective method to break
rocks in open-pit mines. However, its undesirable
effects such as ground vibration, air over-pressure
(AOp), fly rock, back-break, dust and toxic are
evitable. Among these side effects, AOp is consid-
ered the most dangerous. Therefore, it needs to be
predicted and tightly controlled to minimize its
potential adverse impacts on the surrounding envi-
ronment. The results of this study showed that:
 AI techniques are advanced methods in pre-
dicting blast-induced AOp. They are able to
explain very well the nonlinear relationships
between the input variables in predicting
blast-induced AOp. Based on the predictive
models, blast designs can be adjusted to re-
duce the undesirable effects of AOp on the
surrounding environment. However, the
development of AI models is often involved.
 ANN is a powerful AI technique for pre-
dicting blast-induced AOp as well as the
other blasting issues in open-pit mines. In this
study, the ANN models with one, two, and
three hidden layers were employed for AOp
predictions. The results showed that the
ANN 7-9-7-5-1 model yielded the best per-

formance. It can be applied in practical
engineering to predict blast-induced AOp.
 The other AI techniques such as RF, SVR,
GP, BART, BRT, and KNN are also models
that should be considered in different condi-
tions and areas. Their performance can be
optimized more in a specific case or when
they are combined.
 W, R, and RH are the significant factors,
which have a high influence on the perfor-
mance of an AOp predictive model. They
should be used for predicting blast-induced
AOp in open-pit mines. Also, other meteo-
rological factors such as wind speed and
direction should also be taken into consider-
ation when anticipating blast-induced AOp in
future works.
Although different AI techniques have been
reviewed and evaluated for predicting blast-induced
AOp in this study, they should be considered further
when applied to other areas. Also, wind speed and
wind direction should be investigated and discussed
further in forecasting blast-induced AOp for the
future works.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This research was supported by Hanoi Univer-
sity of Mining and Geology (HUMG) and Ministry
of Education and Training of Vietnam (MOET). We
also thank the Center for Mining, Electro-Mechan-
ical Research of HUMG.
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