Investigation Information Release
August 2019
A worker was struck by a suspension link pin while conducting maintenance activities.

The incident occurred while quenching the pin with water shortly after making a hole through the centre of the pin with a thermal lance.

The worker was taken to Singleton Hospital and later transferred to the John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle.

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Stop.
Think.
Be safe at work

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Safety Alert
Flight bar ejects - hitting worker while installing a conveyor chain

The incident occurred at 4pm on 23 June 2019.

The conveyor chain jammed when it was being pulled through the bottom race and around the foot shaft sprocket at the front of the continuous miner.

A 3 tonne sling was looped around both sides of the flight bar and was pulled over the top deck of the conveyor race by a 22 millimetre rope attached to a 10 tonne QDS winch on a load haul dump (LHD) vehicle.

One side of the flight bar failed and was ejected from the tensioned sling towards the worker who was standing near the rib bolter controls on the right hand side of the continuous miner. 

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Bench Failure

A bench above an area containing compressor and generator began fretting. On inspection of the bench some significant cracks had appeared in the bench.

The area at the toe of the bench was immediately bunded and an exclusion zone put in place. Drainage was also installed on the bench to drain water away from the cracks.

Daily monitoring of the cracks has been put in place to identify potential failure.

It is critical that once identifying any cracks, rock falls or potential ground instability, monitoring/measurement of movement is put in place to identify any increase in movement that could indicate imminent failure.

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