Claims:CLAIMS
We Claim :

1. A Coal Mine Monitoring System with real-time health monitoring of the coal miner using Smart Helmet along with alerting mechanism whenever there’s a threshold breach in vitals.
2. The System as claimed in claim 1, further comprises of Disaster-Escape in-built mechanism within the Smart Helmet, in case of mine collapse.
3. The System as claimed in claim 1, further comprises of Disaster-Alerting mechanism ensuring a healthy working environment inside the coal mine.
4. The System as claimed in claim 1, is further based on Authorization and Authentication using alarm sounds when no-access zones are accessed and a unique password using which entering the coal mine is made possible.
5. The System as claimed in claim 1, further comprises of heat maps mechanism to assess the workload distribution inside a coal mine.

Dated this the 23rd day of October 2021

Senthil Kumar B
Agent for the applicant
IN/PA-1549
, Description:FORM 2
THE PATENTS ACT, 1970
(39 of 1970)
&
THE PATENT RULES, 2003
Complete Specification
(See section 10 and rule 13)

1.Title of the Invention : Coal Mine Monitoring System and Coal Miner's Smart Helmet
2. Applicants

Name Nationality Address

Aditya Raj

Shaolin Kataria
Indian

Indian

BTECH IT Student at VIT Vellore,SITE

BTECH IT Student at VIT Vellore,SITE

3. Preamble to the Description :

The following specification particularly describes the invention and the manner in which it is to be performed.

TITLE OF THE INVENTION: COAL MINE MONITORING SYSTEM AND COAL MINER’S SMART HELMET TECHNOLOGICAL FIELD BACKGROUND STUDY OF THE INVENTION
[0001] Coal is primarily a fossil fuel that is one of the key sources of energy that usually occurs in stratified sedimentary deposits. Excessive use of non-renewable sources has forced us to shift to renewable sources but still coal mining is done which is not only a dangerous job, but also life threatening and data reveals that around 103 people in 2015 and 145 people in 2016 died because of accidents in coal mines. There’s no automated prevention scheme inside the coal mines, and the working conditions are neglected, resulting in an unhealthy working environment for the coal miners. Coal miners’ health themselves is vulnerable to many occupational hazards. Human wants are unlimited and in order to satisfy those wants we have limited resources. Considering to the needs of daily basis, non-renewable resources are being consumed at a high rate and are depleting from environment. Resultant being a shift to an alternative resource i.e., renewable resources
as these are abundant in nature. Although, it is good to thrive for sustainable development but hardworking people of present system are forgotten.
[0002] The available products don’t identify the disaster prevention and mitigation techniques using automation. A coal miner’s health vitals are not taken care of, which is why so many die because of overworking or simply because of the constant consumption of toxic air. The prohibited access area is only supervised using CCTV footage, not immediate response alarms. So, keeping this in mind, the proposed invention “Coal Mine Monitoring System and Coal Miner's Smart Helmet” aims to tackle unhealthy working conditions by keeping a constant check on the mines using state-of-the-art IoT sensors along with a helmet.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0003] The proposed invention “Coal Mine Monitoring System and Coal Miner's Smart Helmet” is based upon IoT modules such as Arduino UNO, Raspberry Pi, Node MCU along with certain necessary sensors providing values with low-latency.
[0004] The invention aims to change the way how Coal-Mine jobs are perceived as risky because of unhealthy working conditions and risk of accidents in coal mines. Adding to this, coal miner’s social status isn’t highly valued. Keeping these facts in mind, the proposed system has dual advantages; one of minimizing risk and other of social status as proposed system would be based upon IoT sensors and tantamount alarm system installed at strategic locations of coal mine.
[0005] Novel application in the field of Coal mines is majorly classified under three parts: one being internal monitoring system, other being external monitoring system and the last being a helmet.
[0006] The Internal monitoring system comprises of gas sensor, flame sensor, water level sensor, temperature and humidity sensor, PIR sensor, buzzer, smoke sensor, ultrasonic sensor and shock sensor. All the sensors display their readings on a single monitor screen and these readings are analysed to ascertain any future uncertainty in coal mine.
[0007] The External monitoring system comprises of keypad, cameras and LCD. Keypad is used to enter password and will only grant access if entered key is correct. While cameras are used for providing CCTV coverage of coal mine and LCD is provided that displays Coal Mine welcome text at all times. [0008] The Helmet is equipped with heartbeat sensor, avoidance sensor, laser, flame sensor, buzzer, big sound, and a light-blocking sensor. The smart helmet acts as a companion that monitors workers health, alarms the supervisor in case of any emergency and provides assistance to workers during emergencies like collapsing of coal mine as helmet is equipped with disaster management system with different layers of security.
[0009] Through sensors, water level of coal mine can be ascertained easily and thus, it detects any possibility of flood in the coal mine. Sensors also takes into consideration the fact of heavy rainfalls or excess groundwater seeping through and alerts beforehand regarding possible flooding of the mine.
[0010] Thingspeak, operating on Node MCU, is used as the cloud platform for storing data received from sensors like temperature, humidity or heartbeat, etc., on the basis of which further instructions are directed to specific thresholds. Adding to this, certain components inside the internal monitoring system can be accessed on one tap using mobile phones via Blynk app.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0011] The following description is of exemplary embodiments only and is not intended to limit the scope, applicability or configuration of the invention in any way. Rather, the following description provides a convenient illustration for implementing exemplary embodiments of the invention. Various changes to the described embodiments may be made in the function and arrangement of the elements described without departing from the scope of the invention. In later updates, machine learning algorithm may be used for better analysis of data sets and efficiency of coal mining system.
[0012] The following is a classical model of a smart coal mining system, along with a hybrid helmet designed for coal miners, developed for mining industry to detect hazardous events in the mining industry and avoid unnecessary risks. The novel model involves the use of IoT and connected devices that can be built using cutting edge technologies like Arduino UNO, Raspberry Pi, Node MCU, Thingspeak could platform, Blynk app, along with a whole lot of sensors.
[0013] As we know the underground is a very dark site, the proposed system will provide workers with protective helmet that will act as a friend in the darkness for them. The monitoring section contains alerting units that delivers automatic e-mail to authorised personnel in case of emergencies. The proposed system uses a DHT11 sensor and checks the temperature and humidity levels inside the coal mine giving an idea about the working conditions if whether they are safe for the worker or not, uses Ultrasonic Sensors to detect distance inside the coal mine from different workers. The system enables to track the relevant activity areas inside the coal mine and draw a heat map using visualization methods. The proposed system checks water levels for prior imitation of a possible flood inside the coal mine. Checking for tremors for previous representation of a mine collapse, a flame sensor for fire detection, a PIR sensor for checking motion in restricted areas, uses MQ2 Sensor to check whether the air inside the coal mine is safe for working conditions or not.
[0014] Smart helmet being equipped with heartbeat sensor, avoid sensor, big sound sensor and light blocking sensor. Heartbeat Sensor monitors vitals, Avoid Sensor gives light whenever there is no object. In case rocks start falling onto the miner and the miner struggles to find a path to move out; Avoid Sensor is combined with the buzzer and the LED. Big Sound Sensor is used so that whenever a loud thud comes, the causes could be anything, including something dangerous, so this will give an alert for that. Light Blocking Sensor offers a beep whenever the light is gone, can help the miner find the path through which they can force themselves out. If it gets annoying, the coal miner can stop it simply by turning the smart helmet off.
ADVANTAGES OF THE INVENTION
1. The proposed system will change the way people perceive the jobs of a coal mine. Rugged with occupational hazards, people look down on such jobs. Apart from the working conditions and the risk it carries, a coal miner’s social status isn’t that highly valued. The proposed system benefits both the aspects of the spectrum, the risks involved, and the social status.
2. The plight of the coal miner has been taken into consideration. Not only disaster mitigation plans have been proposed, but disaster prevention techniques have been deployed as well. The working condition inside the coal mine has been taken into consideration. The live monitoring of a coal miner’s health will keep the team intact with trust, and a spirited workforce will lead to prolonged productivity.
3. The traditional technology had no mapping of heat which gives a better idea of workload distribution inside the coal mine, which can help the better allocation of workers, find areas of strengths and weaknesses in the workers’ efficiency. While the proposed invention consists of the above.