## Facts

- Gerald and Betty Large owned about 81 acres of unimproved, uninhabited timberland in Dickenson County, Virginia.
- Clinchfield Coal Company owned the coal estate beneath the tract as successor to coal grantees under 1887 severance deeds.
- Clinchfield planned to mine the coal using longwall mining, which removes an entire panel of coal, uses temporary supports, and permits the roof and overlying strata to collapse and settle after extraction.
- Evidence showed longwall mining would cause a relatively uniform surface subsidence of about three feet, without expected cracking or other significant surface disruption.
- The Larges sought a declaratory judgment that Clinchfield lacked the right to use longwall mining under their land and sought injunctive relief to prohibit that method.
- The trial court found (1) subsidence would occur, but (2) the evidence did not show the surface would be damaged “to any appreciable degree,” and (3) an injunction would cause great economic loss to Clinchfield and the community, with equities favoring Clinchfield.
- Despite those findings, the trial court ultimately entered a final decree prohibiting Clinchfield from using longwall mining; both parties appealed adverse portions of the decree.

## Issues

1. Whether a surface owner may enjoin a mineral owner’s longwall mining based on an asserted “absolute” right of subjacent support when the factfinder determines the mining will cause no appreciable surface damage.
2. Whether the coal severance deeds and Virginia law permit the mineral owner to employ longwall mining that results in subsidence absent appreciable, legally cognizable injury to the surface estate.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Virginia reversed the decree to the extent it prohibited Clinchfield from using longwall mining.
- The Court accepted the trial court’s supported factual finding that longwall mining would not cause appreciable damage to the surface.
- Because appreciable surface damage was not shown, the surface owners were not entitled to declaratory or injunctive relief barring the mining method.

## Legal Principles

- A surface owner’s right of subjacent support does not warrant injunctive relief based on subsidence alone; the claim requires proof of appreciable damage to the surface estate.
- The scope of subjacent-support protection is determined in context, including the parties’ severance deeds and the nature of the estates created.
- Where coal deeds confer broad mining rights, the mineral owner may extract the coal in a commercially reasonable manner using modern methods, so long as the mining does not cause appreciable, compensable harm to the surface.

## Conclusion

The court held that, absent proof of appreciable surface damage, surface owners cannot bar longwall mining merely because it will cause subsidence, and the mineral owner’s deed-based right to mine may be exercised without an injunction in those circumstances.


Large v. Clinchfield Coal Co., 239 Va. 144, 387 S.E.2d 783 (Va. 1990)