The Mukona Group has grown from strength to strength, expanding its technical service offerings to provide worldclass geotechnical services. As the group continues to invest heavily in skills and equipment, it is firmly establishing itself as the local leader in assisting mines in complying with the Global Industry Standard on Tailings Management (GISTM).
The GISTM requires that tailings dam owners conduct regular reviews and risk assessments to ensure the continued safe operation of tailings facilities. In line with these requirements, Mukona In Situ is currently conducting extensive geotechnical investigations at Anglo American’s Unki platinum mine in central Zimbabwe.
The contract includes about 1 500 m of core drilling and pre-drilling for cone penetration (CPTu) testing, resistivity cone penetration testing, seismic cone penetration testing with pore pressure measurements, and electronic vane shear testing (eVST).
According to Solly Phalanndwa, Founder and Managing Director of Mukona Group, the investigation posed significant technical challenges due to hard cemented ground conditions at the tailings dam. However, the company’s expert range of equipment has enabled it to progressively execute the necessary testing.
“Due to hard cemented and thick clays on these tailings deposits, we had to switch from sonic drilling to rotary core drilling in order to penetrate through the dense material,” explains Phalanndwa.
“Unlike the usual probing from the ground level, we had to predrill 10 m to 20 m before deploying the CPTu probes, eVST probes and vibrating wire piezometers. This resulted in extremely long, unsupported rods being pushed with high force – some of which broke and had to be left in the ground. That’s a rare occurrence in this type of work.
SAICE – Civil Engineering, May 2025