Women in Mining: Katelyn Kolb

Katelyn Kolb
Short-Range Dragline Planner, Sabine Mine

Katelyn Kolb graduated in 2014 with a Mining Engineering Degree and a Management Certificate from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology. She has experienced a variety of mining operations throughout the United States; Katelyn’s career endeavors have given her opportunities to assume engineering roles in Alabama, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Mississippi, and now at the Sabine Mine in Texas.

Katelyn enjoys field-engineering roles because these allow her to design a plan and be hands on with crews to help implement designs. Her engineering role after college was located in New Mexico, where she worked her way up to become the Drill and Blast Engineer. During this time, she received her explosives license with the blasting crews. This allowed her to engineer an explosive pattern and help in the field with the blasting crews to implement the designs. An engineered blast pattern is critical to the mining process because an insufficient design can be dangerous and costly for the miners.

She is currently the short-range dragline planner at Sabine Mine. Over the last three years, she has successfully planned for three-to-four draglines on a daily basis. She has designed the box cuts and opening of three new areas, as well as completed the final designs in two different areas. At Sabine, the dragline planner helps to coordinate the timing of plugging the gas wells, coordinates coal flow to the power plant, and is a supervisor for the surveying team.

In addition to her daily dragline tasks, she has become a licensed drone pilot to offer enhanced support the surveying team. She is also involved with environmental projects and designs, and working through our onsite leadership training for supervision. Katelyn has chosen to continue her education and is working towards receiving a Masters in Civil Engineering with a focus on Environmental and Geotechnical properties. Katelyn is a firm believer that you must be proactive in ongoing training and continued education to be efficient and competitive within the mining industry.

Nominated by:
Andy Hawbaker,
President at North American Coal - Sabine Mine