BHP Mitsubishi Alliance (BMA) will continue operating during lightning strikes at its Peak Downs coal mine in the Bowen Basin, Queensland, following court orders.
It all started when the Resources Safety and Health Queensland coal chief inspector Jacques le Roux handed down directives to cease operating at the site during lightning strikes following concerns about the use of heavy mobile equipment during violent electrical storms.
BMA then appealed the directives to the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission, which last week handed down a decision to stay the orders.
The initial directives ordered BMA to shut down operations when there were strikes reported within 16km of the mine in response to two concerns.
The first is the risk of electrocution to the worker operating the equipment if it is struck by lightning.
BMA argued heavy mobile equipment struck by lightning operates as perfect “Faraday cages”, completely protecting workers from electrical charge passing on to the worker inside.
Queensland Industrial Relations Commission President Peter Davis, who handed down the decision, agreed with BMA.
He also agreed that there is a solution to the second area of concern, which was that air-filled tyres have been known to explode when struck by lightning.
“The answer to this problem is to fill the tyres with nitrogen rather than air which contains oxygen,” Davis said according to the Queensland Law Society Proctor.
“This avoids the tyres exploding.”
Peak Downs is one of five metallurgical coal mines in Queensland’s Bowen Basin and it well known for employing some of the biggest mining trucks in the world.
The mine produced around 29 million tonnes of metallurgical coal in the 2022–23 financial year (FY23), a figure that could be impacted by lightning shutdowns affecting hundreds of vehicles over Queensland’s five-month storm season.
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