Quarrying
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(′kwär·ē·iŋ)
(engineering) The surface exploitation and removal of stone or mineral deposits from the earth's crust.
(geology) plucking
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The process of extracting stone for commercial use from natural rock deposits. The industry has two major branches: a dimension-stone branch, involving preparation of blocks of various sizes and shapes for use as building stone, monumental stone, paving stone, curbing, and flagging; and a crushed-stone branch, involving preparation of crushed and broken stone for use as a basic construction, chemical, and metallurgical raw material.
Oxford Dictionary of Geography:
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quarrying
The removal of rock which has broken up by jointing to form blocks. The agents of erosion may be ice, rivers, or the sea. Since the tensile strength of ice is low, glacial quarrying is not possible unless the rock is shattered.
It is suggested that the efficiency of quarrying by ice is related to pore water pressure fluctuations in the subglacial till. When pressures are high, conditions are optimal for the injection of fines into joints and fissures, and the subglacial till becomes ductile. Once the sediment has been injected into fractures, a drop in pressure makes it more rigid. If enough shear stress is exerted, bedrock fragments may then be removed by brittle shear in the fracture fill. The term exaration may be used as a synonym.
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