Innovative technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things, are playing a much larger role in the mining sector in various ways, including increasingly on the safety front.
With today (28 April) being World Day for Safety and Health at Work, Mining.com.au decided to shine a light on the issues currently facing the industry.
World Day for Safety and Health at Work is an annual international campaign started by the International Labour Organization in 2003 to encourage a culture of risk prevention and awareness.
This year’s theme focuses on the impacts of digitalisation and artificial intelligence on workers’ health and safety.
In the modern day, the psychosocial risk to a workforce has become much more of a focus.
Work Safe Australia says the introduction of digitalisation and AI in various forms throughout a workplace may decrease the exposure to physical risks, but can introduce more psychosocial hazards to job roles.
This is largely because of the decreased interpersonal interactions and the intensification of work.
Psychosocial refers to the combined effect that psychological factors and the social environment have on a person’s physical and mental health. This covers things like work-related harassment or bullying, work pressure, workplace violence and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).
Trump’s moves, global ripples
The latter has been particularly frequent in the headlines of late after US President Donald Trump signed an executive order rolling back DEI initiatives in the public and private sectors.
Susan Fleming, Managing Director of Acting Consulting Training (ACT) Australia, says there is an overwhelming sense of people feeling uneasy as a result of the possible implications of Trump’s moves.
“Obviously, there’s external influences hitting us, but it still means the workplace has to legally create a psychosocially safe place for work,” Fleming says in an exclusive interview with Mining.com.au.
“We’re involved in two fundraisers for Lifeline WA and Mates in Mining – suicide prevention, and we’re seeing in terms of safety the mental health area is of great concern.”
ACT Australia delivers storytelling through theatre and film performances to inspire the creation of safer working environments. The company brings actual incidents and imagined scenarios to the stage, with actors portraying workers facing high-risk situations.
One especially concerning development in the past couple of weeks has been the actions of a “reasonable-sized” mining company in making the head of its psychosocial safety program redundant, according to Fleming.
“I wonder what message that has for the organisation,” she notes.
“We’re seeing people like (Australian lawyer) Elizabeth Broderick and the CEO of CEOs for Gender Equity, Ashley McGrath, coming out with a lot of social media at the moment in answer to Trump’s normalising getting rid of DEI.”
Fleming says this is a huge advantage for Australia, which has typically been seen to be increasing its value around DEI.
“Now is a really important time to hold fast and demonstrate throughout leadership and operations that we are valuing DEI,” she says.
“All the research is there, the evidence is there that a diverse workplace has increased economic benefits, no question, and also increased mental health benefits. So Australia has to take a lead here.”
Time is ticking on tailings
According to advisory firm BDO, the mining industry is facing an era of unprecedented challenges, and the effective management of risks with catastrophic impacts is becoming more critical than ever.
Risk Advisory Services partner Anand Raniga says one of the most pressing risks for the mining sector continues to be the health and safety of workers, and the integrity of mining facilities and assets.
“The end-to-end lifecycle management of tailings storage facilities – vital structures used to store waste materials from mining operations; and plant equipment – remains a critical area of concern,” Raniga says.
“Failures in these systems, which have the potential to cause large-scale environmental disasters and production issues, represent a catastrophic risk.
“Mining companies must prioritise safety systems, robust maintenance strategies, regular inspections, and responsive management protocols to prevent these failures so that workers, communities, customers, and the environment are protected.”
Both exploration and mining have their own set of safety risks, but companies are working to get ahead of them before someone gets seriously hurt.
Critical risks demand critical action
Simon Wensley, CEO of bauxite miner Metro Mining (ASX:MMI), says there has been a shift in focus over the last couple of years to critical risks and Metro Mining is very much in support of those changes and participating in them.
“It’s just much more of a move toward what we call critical risks. So things that really can hurt someone or can even kill someone,” Wensley tells Mining.com.au.
“We’ve been working very hard, for example, to develop a much more in-depth critical risk register across our site and putting controls in place.
“We’re very much focusing on what we call HPIs, high potential incidents, and that informs our critical risk register.
“We really go in depth in analysing any HPI that we get and we do what’s called an ICAM (incident cause analysis method), which is like an investigation where you go and look at the root causes.
“We really take a lot of time investigating high potential incidents. We actually encourage the reporting of those throughout the site. We don’t try to minimise them.”
ACT Australia’s Fleming says effective reporting is the very fundamental of a good safety culture.
“Effective reporting to me is evidence that there is a healthy safety culture where trust and respect are paramount,” she says.
Metro Mining is in the business of mining bauxite at its Bauxite Hills Mine, located around 95km north of Weipa in Cape York, Queensland.
Bauxite Hills is a single operating mine, where bauxite is mined, hauled, screened and then placed on barges for transhipping to large ocean-going vessels roughly 10 nautical miles offshore.
Some of the technological advancements Metro Mining is implementing include drone monitoring of stockpiles and cameras and drones to measure the draft of the company’s barges.
“When we measure the draft of our barges, that in the past has required humans to get out onto the barge and look at the draft where it’s sitting in the water, and that obviously puts them at risk of a man overboard incident when the weather gets difficult or in the dark, for example,” Wensley explains.
“So we’re putting things like technology, cameras and drones into these spaces to try and engineer out the human presence, if you like, in those more dangerous situations.”
More than a camping trip
Alchemy Resources (ASX:ALY), meanwhile, explores for gold and base metals in remote areas of Western Australia and New South Wales, which comes with its own set of challenges.
CEO James Wilson says the important areas of focus for him is ensuring his personnel have the mindset that every aspect of a working day can present a hazard.
“This is amplified in exploration as we have small crews, remote workspaces and limited backup if something goes wrong,” Wilson tells Mining.com.au.
“I believe exploration can be more risky than mining, you’re flying solo with maybe a two man team in a remote location.
“Some might think it’s a camping holiday but there’s so many areas that can present critical problems – mechanical (car breaks down in a remote area), snake bite, car accident, electric shock from devices attached to generators, falling injury – there’s so much to be prepared for.
“Also remember – your remote location can sometimes present some psychological impacts and, again, that’s important for the company to make sure everyone’s doing well and doing things right.”
A lot of Alchemy’s safety tools are digital, according to Wilson, from Zoleo two way satellite messengers to Starlink.
But Wilson adds “at the end of the day you can’t beat a good old analogue call to see how the team is doing, see if they need anything and most importantly to make sure everyone is safe and sound.”
Mitch Thomas, CEO of South America-focused copper explorer Solis Minerals (ASX:SLM), agrees early stage exploration is risky business.
“It’s a different risk profile from later-stage mining, but not necessarily less dangerous,” he tells this news service.
“The lack of infrastructure and dynamic nature of early exploration can increase certain risks if not well managed.”
Solis has a portfolio of copper projects in the Coastal Belt of Peru.
While accessing the higher and most prospective part of the company’s Ilo Norte concessions is just a 22km journey north along the highway, in order to access other parts of the project Solis must venture further out into more remote terrain.
The company has to travel 78km northeast initially on the Pan American Highway to the Department capital Moquegua and continue 32km to the small village of Cruz Misionera. From there it is necessary to travel to the south-west on gravel tracks about 26km to the project site.
Thomas says digitalisation and AI can greatly improve safety by reducing exposure to hazards, enabling remote monitoring, and identifying risks early through predictive analytics.
“But they also bring challenges — including over-reliance on systems, uneven access to training, and reduced human oversight,” he cautions.
“These tools should support sound judgment, not replace it, and we need to ensure all workers are equipped to use them effectively and safely.”
Man versus machine
One of the areas of safety that ACT Australia is exploring is the “interface between man and machine” in a new production centred on aviation in defence.
“I was commissioned by Safeskies Australia to create a new play around the impacts of different facets of safety on air crew,” Fleming explains.
“Now, if you can imagine a pilot is receiving all this data, and yet he or she still has to rely on experience and intuition, this is not unusual in the safety space, particularly in process safety.
“We see in an incredibly important role such as this, time and time again, where a pilot has to make a judgement, and that judgement has to be on all the data available, but in the end it can come down to his own intuition and experience.”
Solis’ Thomas says overall the global mining industry has made strong progress in embedding safety as a core value.
“Many companies now treat safety as a leadership issue, not just a compliance one,” he tells this news service.
However, there are still plenty of areas where exploration and mining companies can make improvements.
Thomas says early stage operations and smaller players still need more support and consistency — especially when it comes to vehicle interactions, contractor safety and remote logistics.
“Better integration of drilling contractors into safety systems is also key, and we’d benefit from more open sharing of lessons and best practices across companies — especially in the exploration space,” he notes.
This is where organisations like ACT Australia are helping companies lift their safety game.
When it comes to the traditional powerpoint delivery of training on psychological safety, safety culture, leadership and DEI in mining, the audience engagement plummets, according to ACT Australia.
However, feedback and insights from the organisation’s production of ‘The Slip: What Good Looks Like’ late last year showed that 99.5% of all participants found value in learning about safety culture and leadership through live theatre storytelling.
Additionally, 99.3% of all participants believe they can apply lessons from the production to their workplace, and 97% found it relevant to their workplace.
‘The Slip: What Good Looks Like’, originally commissioned by the Mental Awareness, Respect and Safety (MARS) Program for Safe Work Month 2024, will return for two open days.
These open days will be raising funds for Lifeline WA – Resourceful Mind on 29 April and for Mates in Mining on 30 April.
Write to Angela East at Mining.com.au
Images: Mining.com.au, ACT Australia, Mates in Mining, Metro Mining & Solis Minerals
