Fatigue- A Scary Reality

This happened in Mexico. An engineer who was working at the mine at the time of this incident has been one of my annual refresher folks, and I always ask him to explain the picture when I’m lucky enough to have him in class. As I understand it, the operator fell asleep at the wheel, traveled off the haul road, and awoke heading for the pit. Obviously he made every effort to stop the truck, and the material he was travelling over was soft and slippery. The truck came to rest as indicated in the photos.

There were no witnesses to the event, so one has to imagine that the operator said a prayer or two, regained his composure, and scrambled away from the haul truck. The facility secured the truck, spent the next months constructing a road above that first bench, and finally drove the truck safely out.

Fatigue is something I’m seeing brought up more and more in my classes these days. Our mines are working with fewer people, and those fewer people are working harder, longer hours, to keep costs down and production up. Scares the heck out of me.

Thanks CB for Sharing.- “Look like a good berm might have prevented this. Sure looks scary to me.”- DD