SLOPE STABILITY & MONITORING
Collaboration capabilities
Trimble is focusing more on mining as a target market today, including a new partnership with GroundProbe announced in late 2024. IM caught up with Louden Grieser, Trimble Product Manager- Monitoring and Mining; and Ben Moke Senior Manager- GroundProbe, Orica Digital Solutions
Q Can you summarise the advantages of the joint approach with GroundProbe?
The collaboration between Trimble and Orica’ s GroundProbe, announced in late 2024, offers significant advantages to mining customers, particularly in the realm of slope stability and geotechnical monitoring. The core benefits of this joint approach can be summarised as follows. First simplified sourcing and deployment. Previously, mining operators might have had to coordinate with multiple vendors for their slope stability monitoring needs, such as one for radar, another for total stations, and separate software. Now, customers can purchase a comprehensive portfolio of slope stability monitoring solutions from a single point of contact, specifically through GroundProbe’ s sales channels. This simplifies the procurement process and deployment of monitoring programs. The partnership also facilitates more seamless integrations between Trimble and GroundProbe sensors and software, specifically Trimble 4D Control™ and GroundProbe’ s MonitorIQ ® Desktop. This improved integration enables smoother data flow between different monitoring technologies. By incorporating various mine monitoring sensors into one environment, professionals can visualise a more complete picture of site conditions. This holistic view enhances decision-making capabilities regarding slope stability risks and overall site safety. Mining operators gain greater reliability through the combined global support networks of GroundProbe and Trimble, which ensure comprehensive service and assistance. The combined expertise and efficiencies of both companies aim to help mining operators explore growth opportunities more easily by enhancing overall productivity and operational effectiveness, especially in environments requiring 24 / 7 / 365 operation and precise risk management. Finally. through Orica Digital Solution’ s Geotechnical Specialist Services( GSS), mining operators benefit from continuous 24 / 7 remote monitoring and advanced geotechnical reporting. This includes real-time analysis of data from radars, total stations, GNSS, and a variety of other sensors deployed across site operations, enabling proactive decision-making, streamlined and efficient reporting, and enhanced operational safety. The collaboration with Trimble enables Orica Digital Solutions and GroundProbe to deliver a truly integrated slope stability monitoring solution- combining Trimble’ s advanced total stations, 3D laser scanners, and software with GroundProbe’ s proven radar and geotechnical services. achievements so far are the establishment of a global streamlined sales channel and the foundational technical integration between our key software platforms, which will pave the way for future customer engagements with this combined portfolio. Recently, in Antofagasta, Chile, Trimble Authorised Distributor GeoCom and GroundProbe hosted a joint customer event focusing on these combined offerings to the mining operators in the region to promote the partnership and showcase the offerings working together.
Q From a technical standpoint can you go into more detail on the potential advantages in a mining pit of using for example GroundProbe radar stations together with Trimble total stations?
The combined use of GroundProbe radar stations and Trimble total stations in a mining pit offers significant technical advantages due to their complementary strengths. GroundProbe Radars such as SSR-FX and SSR-SARx use radio waves to scan and detect movement. Their primary advantage is their all-weather capability, unaffected by dust, rain, fog, or low light, and ability to cover vast areas quickly, providing continuous, real-time surface deformation data across wide zones. They excel at detecting subtle movements over large areas and are crucial for early warning systems. Radars provide a continuous‘ heatmap’ of movement across a slope. Trimble Total Stations, both robotic and automatic, use laser-based measurements to track the precise 3D position of discrete prisms installed on the slope. They offer submillimetre accuracy for specific points. Total stations are excellent for confirming localised movements with high precision and for establishing precise control networks. Radars provide broadarea, continuous coverage, acting as a wide-net early warning system. They can quickly identify general areas of concern, even in challenging atmospheric conditions. Total stations can then be precisely directed to target specific areas of interest identified by the radar, providing highly accurate, localised deformation measurements on critical points, such as around faults, unstable structures, or active mining fronts. Using both technologies provides redundancy in monitoring, which is critical for safetycritical applications. If one system has a temporary issue, such as a prism is obscured, or radar experiences localised interference, the other can still provide data. The data from one system can validate or refine the insights from the other. Radar data can highlight an area, and total station data can confirm the exact movement of a specific point within that area, providing higher confidence in the assessment.
Q What has been achieved via this collaboration so far in relation to a combined offering for slope stability applications and can you give any specific examples of how you have worked with customers?
The collaboration has enabled the GroundProbe network to offer Trimble’ s advanced robotic and automatic total stations. This means customers can now acquire a more complete suite of monitoring tools directly, complementing their existing range of sensors and software. A key technical achievement is the focus on enabling more seamless integrations between Trimble and GroundProbe sensors and software, specifically linking Trimble 4D Control™ with MonitorIQ ® to ensure smooth data flow. This integration is designed to allow for a comprehensive visualisation of site conditions from various data sources. The primary
26 International Mining | AUGUST 2025