Abstract: A system and method for high wall bench mining, for example, of horizontal coal seams in mountains, includes a launch platform having two side-by-side tracks for guiding mining equipment, and utilizes two continuous miner machines and conveyor cars. Two side-by-side mine entries can be worked simultaneously, one miner advancing deeper into the coal seam and conveyor cars being added behind the miner at a first mine entry, and the mining completed and cars and miner retreating and being extracted from a second mine entry. As conveyor cars are being extracted onto one track from the mine entry that a string is retreating from, the cars are moved across the launch platform to the other track and are added behind the advancing miner machine launched from that track into the other mine entry.