Meaning & use
coal mine
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Meanings
nouncountable
A place, either underground or an open pit in the earth, where coal is dug out and brought to the surface.
Grammar: A normal countable noun: one coal mine, several coal mines.
Patterns
- work in a coal mine
- a coal mine in somewhere
His grandfather spent thirty years underground in a coal mine in Wales.
The government plans to close the last coal mine in the region by 2030.
A new coal mine was opened near the river, and local farmers protested.
nouncountablefigurative
Used figuratively, as in canary in a coal mine, for something that gives early warning of danger.
Grammar: Almost always appears inside the idiom canary in a coal mine, not on its own.
Patterns
- a canary in a coal mine
Small shops closing early were seen as the canary in the coal mine for the whole economy.
Scientists call frogs the canary in the coal mine for water pollution.
Word forms
| plural | coal mines |
|---|
Common combinations
- work in a coal mine
- Many men in the town used to work in a coal mine.
- abandoned coal mine
- Children were warned never to play near the abandoned coal mine.
- open-pit coal mine
- The open-pit coal mine stretched for miles across the plain.
- coal mine collapse
- A coal mine collapse trapped twelve workers overnight.
- close a coal mine
- The company decided to close a coal mine that was no longer profitable.
- canary in a coal mine
- Rising rents may be the canary in a coal mine for the housing market.
Synonyms and how they differ
- colliery
- Colliery is mainly British and refers to the mine together with its buildings and machinery, so it feels more old-fashioned and industrial.
- pit
- Pit is an informal British word for a coal mine and is common in talk of mining communities, though it can also mean any hole in the ground.
- coalfield
- A coalfield is a whole region containing coal deposits, not a single working site like a coal mine.
Word family
Commonly confused: coal mine or coalfield?
coal mine vs coalfield
A coalfield is a large area with coal underground, while a coal mine is one particular site where the coal is actually extracted.
Practice
Her grandfather spent forty years working deep underground in a ___.
Choose one answer.
A coal mine is the place where people dig coal. A coal plant burns coal to make electricity, and a coalfield is a region, not a place of work underground.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “coal mine”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.