Safety
Mining companies already hold a wealth of safety intelligence, but the challenge is turning it into knowledge workers can recognise and act on before a near miss becomes an injury.
Arafura Rare Earths Managing Director and CEO Darryl Cuzzubbo told the WA Mining Club that Nolans is moving from critical minerals rhetoric to construction reality, but the real test will be processing, ramp-up, suppliers and whether Australia can help build a serious rare earths supply chain outside China.
When Whitehaven Coal acquired BMA’s Daunia and Blackwater mines in Queensland’s Bowen Basin, it wasn’t just the company’s biggest purchase to date.
Unexpected piezometer trends in a tailings dam triggered an investigation that uncovered an overlooked variable in dissipation testing – the type of saturation fluid.
AI isn’t the risk in mining.
Seiche waves might be rare in mining, but new research shows they could pack enough force to overtop in-pit tailings storage facilities with serious consequences for operations, infrastructure, and safety.
Mining loves a neat correlation – tonnes per shift, dollars per ounce, emissions per unit, but as Peter Burton pointed out at AusIMM’s Critical Minerals 2025 in Perth, one thing that refuses to fit a tidy graph is safety performance.
A series of recent mine safety incidents in New South Wales and Queensland has reinforced ongoing concerns about worker safety in both underground and surface coal operations.
Queensland’s Coal Mines Inspectorate has warned that coal mining operations are continuing to report repeat safety incidents, with fatigue, dust exposure, fires on mobile equipment, and falls from plant access systems among the most common issues identified in its September 2025 incident periodical.
It’s not every day a water cart performs a wheelie on a mine stand—but when it does, the lessons for mechanical engineering and site safety are hard to ignore.
