Emergency Response
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.
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.
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.
When Jeff Samuels took the stage at the NSW Resources Regulator’s 33rd Mechanical Engineering Safety Seminar, he didn’t mince words: excavators roll over, people die, and the only way to ensure real protection is through ISO-certified rollover and falling object protective structures.
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.
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.
In open-pit mining, getting the right information at the right time can mean the difference between precise grade control and costly dilution - and one technology is giving operators a sharper, faster view of what lies beneath each bench.
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.
