Wake up call for FIFO workers as study finds that 90 percent of accidents in the mining industry occur from human error.
While the mining industry has made significant improvements in safety over the years, the industry still holds one of the highest rates of fatalities and injuries. Studies have shown that around 90% of accidents in the mining industry occur from human error. Majority of these accidents are a result of staff fatigue.
“As humans, we require about seven to nine hours of sleep per night. People are getting approximately six hours of sleep working 12 hour day shifts, five and a half after 12 hour night shifts.”
Impact
As a result of long hours and physically demanding tasks, fatigue has become a critical concern in the mining industry, and with new legislation in Australia and New Zealand, business owners are now obliged to maintain a safe work culture in their workplace. Fatigue increases the risk of workers making mistakes and errors in judgement, as well as the likelihood of micro-sleeps, in which an individual enters a sleep state for a few seconds. In this state, they are not reactive. Fatigue also slows down your reaction time, increasing the risk of accidents occurring. Workers experiencing fatigue have a greater risk of developing sleeping orders. This can then lead to further complications such as lower productivity, equipment or property damage, injuries (which can result in lost time, medical expenses, workers compensation), health disorders, lower morale and a higher turnover rate.
Fatigue Management
Reduced alertness is a concerning but preventable health and safety risk. To mitigate the effects of fatigue in mining, introducing regulatory approaches to the workforce is crucial. This includes training staff in identifying fatigue risk factors, consistently evaluating practices and policies, and training staff in fatigue management.
The TOKN Solution
Technology has enabled the ability to manage risks in an engaging and time efficient way- monitoring, predicting, measuring and reporting hazards and incidents. TOKN’s FieldSafe app is an award winning cloud safety solution that proactively manages risk, giving you complete visibility of all your safety interactions as they happen and ensures a complete compliance record. Used by technicians across the globe, FieldSafe simplifies your safe system of work. It is quick to deploy, flexible and puts safety in the hands of the people that matter. FieldSafe includes fatigue assessments to identify the risk, find a solution to prevent that risk (behavioural, physiological) and finally implement the change- it’s all about having clear goals and procedures to improve the safety of your workforce!
The TOKN Fatigue assessment app allows you to capture your fatigue assessments digitally, ensuring your team is always fit for work. Your team receives alerts to any high fatigue assessments, where managers must ‘action’ the assessment and leave a note. Reduce duplication and paperwork.
The Mobile Learning Management System (LMS) is one of TOKN’s popular features that enables you to instantly upload and publish inductions and training materials to your teams or individuals. Your team gets notified and can complete the module in their own time on their own device. Centrally track your team’s progress in your cloud-based dashboard from anywhere. Consistently engage your workforce with useful knowledge and training tools and boost productivity.
FieldSafe allows you to send safety messages in real time to your workforce, increasing awareness and promoting wellbeing in the workforce.
The FieldSafe Safety Suite includes:
- Risk assessments
- Fatigue Assessment
- Safety Broadcast Messaging
- Learning Management
- Journey management
- Incident Reporting
- Investigations and timelines
- Action management
- Hazard report
- Vehicle inspection
- Prestart
- Take 5
- Safe Act Observation
- Planned Task Observations
- Job Hazard Analysis
- And More!