Minister welcomes collaborative mine safety data projects 

Wednesday, 24 August 2016

• Data from 14 years of DMP accident and incident reports to be independently analysed
• Main hazards for mine workers are falling from height, working under a load and being struck, or crushed by heavy machinery 

Mines and Petroleum Minister Sean L'Estrange has welcomed a collaborative project between the Department of Mines and Petroleum (DMP), The University of Western Australia (UWA) and Edith Cowan University (ECU) to glean further knowledge from 14 years of existing accident and incident reports.

Speaking at DMP's recent Registered Managers Forum, Mr L'Estrange said minesite safety remained his number one priority.

UWA is proposing to obtain insights into hazards, injuries and contributing factors by analysing the text in the narrative descriptions within up to 800 incident reports.  ECU will also compare the Western Australian mining industry's incident ratios with international models.

"The goal is to identify common causation factors," the Minister said.

"I am particularly interested in data analysis which could identify trends in causes of serious minesite incidents and near misses so we can further improve our mines' safety inspection regimes," he said.

Fact File

• The DMP Registered Managers Forum was created in 2014 to drive a positive cultural change in mine safety
• It allows the department to engage closely with mine management and key decision makers