Energy Minerals
When Bengalla Mining Company lost tyre fitter Quinten Moore in 2018, the tragedy forced a deep reckoning: could leadership and supervision be strengthened to ensure safer outcomes? For Bengalla, the answer was not only yes, but essential.
When a Queensland flood swallowed a dragline and left an underground portal 60 metres underwater, Wade Ludlow knew mine levee design had to change.
It’s not every day you hear about two massive shafts being sunk side by side in Australian coal country, each with its own design, equipment, and risks.
When Barry McKay walked into Ashton Coal and saw machines cutting stone instead of coal, he knew something had to change.
A failed park brake piston seal was all it took to reduce a Whitehaven EH5000 dump truck to ashes – and the lesson, as Greg Fenton told the Mechanical Engineering Safety Seminar (MESS 2025), is one that should alarm every mining professional running large electric-drive fleets.
Even with control plans, take-fives, and risk assessments stacked high, mining engineers admit incidents still happen because the real world never plays out as neatly as the documents.
When a digger operator says a new system lets them “see trucks in blind spots you don’t see,” you know it’s more than just another safety add-on – it’s changing how mining crews work.
Deep underground in the Illawarra, a battery electric transporter called Driftex is rewriting the rules of coal mining by beating diesel on safety, speed and cost.
After a shaky start to 2025, the Australian exploration sector appears to be tentatively turning a corner.
Contractor safety in Queensland’s coal sector isn’t just flawed—it’s dangerously broken, and one veteran risk expert is calling time on the whole system.
