Planning permission was granted to sink two 7.315 m (24 feet) diameter shafts here in 1976, and preliminary work began in 1977.
Thyssen (GB) Ltd began sinking the 708 metre deep shafts in June 1978 and reached the Barnsley seam in 1982. Work on developing the mine took until January 1988, when mining began.
When the neighbouring North Selby Mine was closed in July 1997 because of geological problems, owing to its depth, its take was merged with Stillingfleet’s. Nevertheless, continuous losses forced UK Coal to announce the phased closure of its Selby complex in July 2002. Under this process, coal production at Stillingfleet ended on July 30th 2004.
| 1995 | 2,250,000 tonnes |
| 1996 | 2,752,000 |
| 1997 | 3,630,000 |
| 1998 | 3,530,000 |
| 1999 | 1,974,000 |
| 2000 | 1,902,000 |
| 2001 | 1,691,000 |
