Over the past 6 months, there have been 46 vehicle interaction incident notifications reported to the Regulator, which is an increasing trend throughout all sectors of the mining industry in NSW.
Of the notifications made, 45% were from surface coal mines, 26% from surface metalliferous and quarry operations and 32% from both underground coal and metalliferous mines.
A review of these incidents indicated that the predominant causes have been a lack of or inadequate communication between people involved in the incidents and a lack of situational awareness on the part of operators of equipment involved in the incidents. Instances were also noted where procedures were not followed and equipment had malfunctioned.
This safety bulletin (PDF, 344.99 KB) provides advice for the NSW mining industry.