The act of taking water from a
mine that is being operated has been done since
Neolithic times. In the past it was done by using a
shadoof, digging deeper dikes so that gravity would remove the water, by mounting leather water-filled buckets on water wheels or, if nothing else, carrying water-filled buckets manually. The
Archimedes' screw was also historically used to pump water out of mines. Where no dewatering techniques were effective the mine had to be shut down due to flooding. In the 15th century mine dewatering techniques made some technical advancements as the first mechanized wooden pumps were used in the German
Rammelsberg mine (Lower Saxony), and later in the Ehrenfriedersdorf (Saxony) mines in the 16th century. With the
Industrial Revolution, the demand for more coal also demanded dewatering of ever-deeper mines. Water was put in buckets and removed using rope conveyors powered by horses on treadmills.
Thomas Savery was the first to realize that a steam engine could be used to pump water out of mines, so he patented an early form of a steam engine. His proposed engine however, was ineffective and problematic in design. It could not pump water higher than above water level. The
atmospheric engine, invented by
Thomas Newcomen in 1712, combined the ideas of Thomas Savery, who he was forced to go into partnership with due to Savery's patent, and
Denis Papin, using his invention of a
piston. It was the first practical application of the steam engine in a mine and was used to dewater coal and tin mines. The first reliable metal pump was developed by
József Károly Hell and used in
Schemnitz in 1749. In the 20th century
submersible pumps offered another innovation in mine dewatering. Currently dewatering techniques and systems are so advanced and well defined for each type of mine - open pit or underground - that even mines thousands of metres deep are successfully dewatered. ==Problems with mine dewatering==