Rio Tinto Coal Australia mine recognised for safety innovation

When it comes to safety innovation, Rio Tinto Coal Australia's Hail Creek Mine near Mackay is amongst the best of the best.

Hail Creek Mine was last night honoured as a finalist for a safety innovation at a major health and safety awards presentation in Townsville.

The mine was named a state finalist for the Innovation Award at the Queensland Mining Industry Health and Safety Innovation Awards for reducing maintenance intervention by engineering out components that had high failure rates in 9020 Draglines.

Hail Creek Mine General Manager Operations, Andrew Woodley said the innovation reduces the risks associated with maintenance personnel working in hazardous conditions.

"Our Maintenance crews identified the risks involved in repairing parts of the dragline 70 metres above the ground" Mr Woodley said.

"In analysing the causes and risks associated with the task, the team noticed design issues with the assembly component, which regularly resulted in component failure and ultimately required maintenance intervention.

"Lead by our Hail Creek Maintenance Projects Superintendent, a project team redesigned the roller assembly component which has minimised maintenance intervention and wear and tear.

"The new design has essentially eliminated the need to access the component to repair cracking and has thus reduced team exposure to the risks associated with working at heights."

"As well as reducing these significant safety risks, the innovation has also reduced unscheduled downtime on the machine.

This saving has been estimated at 560,000 bank cubic metres per annum (over 1.2million tonnes of waste), with additional cost savings of $230,000 per annum."

Mr Woodley said Hail Creek Mine had designed an innovation that has the ability to be transferred across the mining industry to all dragline fleets.

"Our entry demonstrated the time and effort put in by our maintenance crews to reach the goal of developing a culture and workplace that strives for zero injuries," Mr Woodley said.

Mr Woodley congratulated all at Hail Creek Mine who had been involved in the innovation.

"Being named a finalist puts Rio Tinto Coal Australia at the forefront of safety and imposes an even greater challenge - to not only maintain this improvement, but to continue to seek more safety innovations across the site and keep up the momentum towards our goal of zero injuries," Mr Woodley said.

ENDS

Media Enquiries:
Alison Smith
Rio Tinto Coal Australia
07 3361 4223 / 0438 787 038

Media release - Rio Tinto Coal Australia mine recognised for safety innovation [PDF: 22 KB]