Abstract: In order to analyze the key factor leading to spontaneous combustion of coal in the gob and take correspounding measures to prevent the occurrence of coal spontaneous combustion, the analytic hierarchy process was used to construct the hierarchical model for analyzing the spontaneous combustion cause of coal in the gob, various causes of spontaneous combustion of the residual coal in the gob were analyzed, the weight of spontaneous combustion caused by the residual coal in the gob was calculated, and the key factor leading to spontaneous combustion of coal in the gob was determined, all of these provided reliable theoretical basis for preventing spontaneous combustion of coal in the gob.