Abstract: Aiming at the problems of large engineering quantity, high cost and influencing mining replacement in high drainage roadway, the reasonable layout range, drainage mechanism and key influencing factors of directional long borehole in roof are analyzed. According to orthogonal experiment and variance analysis, the sensitivity index of extraction effect was determined. In the 1305 working face of Licun Mine, the test of roof directional long drilling instead of high drainage roadway was carried out. The test results show that the roof directional long drilling achieves the effect of gas drainage in high drainage roadway, and the gas concentration in the upper corner is controlled within the safe range. The construction progress is fast and the cost is low, which effectively solves the tense situation of mining replacement in Licun Mine.