Digitisation is key to safety

EPIROC UNDERSTANDS THAT DIGITAL SOLUTIONS CAN HELP TO ENSURE SAFETY ON A MINE SITE WITHOUT COMPROMISING PRODUCTION OR WORKFLOW.

According to Safe Work Australia, the country is on the right track in terms of improving the number of fatalities in the workplace.

Forty-five such fatalities were recorded in 2023 as of late April, a notable drop from 66 at the same time in 2022.

Regardless of the decrease, it remains vital that the resources sector, specifically mining operations, has safety measures at the forefront of all activities to reduce – and ultimately eliminate – hazards so fatality numbers do not increase.

One of the best ways to reduce hazards is through the implementation of digital safety solutions.

If a hazard or an emergency presents itself, the mining operator can use digital solutions to trace how the risk came about before using that data to address the issue and introduce measures to avoid the risk from reoccurring.

Original equipment manufacturer (OEM) Epiroc encourages a holistic approach in creating digital safety solutions. The company’s digital solutions allow a mine to work with mixed fleets, existing equipment, and existing partners to increase health and safety for operations, reduce risk and support regulatory compliance.

Epiroc offers a variety of safety solutions to help organisations make potentially life-saving decisions and to better understand why incidents occurred in the first place.

Safe to Work spoke with Epiroc business line manager digitalisation

Andreas Prill about the development of the digital safety solutions.

“The core objective for our solution development always was and always will be to make working at a mine safer than ever before, and we believe we have contributed to that with our solutions,” Prill said. “We aim to be at the forefront and to provide something that nobody else has ever done before and something that nobody else will probably be capable of doing in the same way in the foreseeable future.”

Given the inherent risks of working in the mining industry, Prill said Epiroc has a very clear focus on safety.

“As an OEM to the mining industry, we play an important role and have a responsibility to contribute to the highest possible safety in mining,” Prill said.

“True innovation and acceleration of the mining industry to make mining safer, greener and more productive is very important to Epiroc.”

Mobilaris Situational Awareness

Epiroc’s Mobilaris Situational Awareness acts as an underground radar, lifting the lid on underground mines to gain visibility and transparency of assets, personnel, vehicles and objects in real-time.

This information is displayed through a three-dimensional visualisation of the mine and everything underground. By knowing the position of people and machinery, operators using Mobilaris Situational Awareness can quickly and accurately make missioncritical decisions.

The solution acts as a learning tool as the geofences mark areas as safe or unsafe, and occurrences that led to unsafe situations can be replayed and analysed.

In addition, Mobilaris Situational Awareness allows traffic to be managed in and around risk areas, and alerts can be raised when certain thresholds are reached and ventilation can be triggered on machines or personal entering certain areas, all with the aim to have a safer and more controlled mine operation.

Mobilaris Emergency Support

In an emergency, every second counts.

Epiroc’s Mobilaris Emergency Support application acts as a ‘toolbox’ to facilitate safe, efficient and synchronised mine evacuations.

It alerts rescue personnel of people’s location within the site during an evacuation through the use of the Mobilaris Virtual tag board and a three-dimensional interactive visualisation of the mine.

The application features emergency messaging through various channels so relevant personnel can be informed about an emergency, and those personnel can acknowledge when that communication has been received.

Epiroc said having the system in place has been proven to shorten overall emergency response time by as much as 50 per cent.

Due to the application automating a significant portion of the response process, the emergency crew has the chance to focus on those in danger and prioritise who needs help first.

Emergency personnel can use the system to customise checklists and conduct an evacuation analysis by using the history viewer.

The system can be used to determine the assets to search for, which can then be viewed and followed in real-time. This allows valuable information to be gathered by understanding traffic patterns and investigating evacuation events and accidents.

Mobilaris Onboard

Epiroc’s Mobilaris Onboard application is currently the only digital safety solution that displays similar navigation to Google Maps for an underground mine.

With a precision of 5–10m without the use of a global positioning system or any other dedicated infrastructure, Mobilaris Onboard can be used to search for a destination, a point of interest or a refuge chamber, while also providing turn-by-turn navigation and traffic awareness.

A vehicle that is running Mobilaris Onboard or is equipped with a tag can easily be seen by other drivers, allowing them to move out of the way well before the vehicle has come to a stop and backs up to give way, thus helping to reduce collisions and other accidents.

The application provides additional information such as the type of vehicle that is incoming and its speed. In the event of an emergency, the driver of a light or heavy vehicle can quickly choose the shortest route to one of the closest refuge chambers.

Mobilaris Pocketmine

Miners can use Mobilaris PocketMine to access critical safety information such as the location of every asset, staff member and vehicle on the go with their smart phone.

In a pressure-filled emergency scenario, determining which direction to follow in order to reach the nearest refuge chamber can create an especially stressful, and potentially very dangerous, situation.

With the Mobilaris PocketMine on a smartphone, the button can be pressed to gain a list of the three closest refuge chambers. Once a chamber has been found, the operator can see the progress of the mine evacuation in real-time.

According to Prill, all of Epiroc’s digital safety solutions are developed in close collaboration with the company’s clients, ensuring they are relevant and applicable to a specific mining operation.

“Some of the feedback (we receive from our clients) includes improved mine efficiency, utilisation and safety through reducing time to get key personnel to key areas within the mine, or via simple asset-tagging underground – being able to find assets quickly,” Prill said.

“We value all feedback and requests for improvements to make our solutions better and use agile solution development to incorporate change requests into our solutions in a timely manner.

“Epiroc aims to provide best in class safety with all our products and solutions.”