Campaign highlights risk of heavy vehicle collisions in mining

The NSW Resources Regulator has visited more than 13,000 mine workers as part of an awareness campaign to highlight the risk of collisions involving heavy mining equipment. The campaign, which was conducted over a 15-day period in May 2021, saw 41 Resources Regulator inspectors deliver presentations to more than 300 work crews at 37 mine sites across the state.

The campaign, which was run with the cooperation of the mine operators, saw 10,700 workers comprising 256 work crews at 27 open-cut coalmines, and 2700 workers comprising 67 work crews across a combination of 10 surface and underground metalliferous mines.

The Resources Regulator’s Chief Inspector, Gavin Burns, said the while the Resources Operator would always focus on ensuring mine operators provided a safe operation, this campaign was about ensuring that mine workers understand that they have an obligation to keep themselves and their workmates safe.

“Our investigations into incidents involving heavy mining equipment has identified that fundamental practices such as positive communication, complying with traffic rules, driving to conditions or basic hazard awareness are repeatedly being identified as a contributing factor for potential workplace incidents. Near-miss incidents involving vehicles have the potential to seriously injure or kill, due to the sheer size of the equipment typically involved,” said Burns.

Burns added that the campaign was also about reminding mine operators to review their safety management systems to ensure there are effective verification processes in place to check that controls are being effectively implemented.

“The feedback from mine managers, workers and inspectors on the campaign was overwhelmingly positive and we hope that workers will take the learnings and maintain a state of heightened awareness when operating on or near heavy mining equipment,” said Burns.

The Resources Regulator has published a report, video and poster about the campaign to its website, as well as the presentation used in the campaign as a resource that can be accessed by mine workers at any time.

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