An ergonomics evaluation of the haulage and transportation of mining supplies. Final report on CEC Contract 7247/12/014

In recent years, haulage and transport have been the biggest source of fatalities and serious accidents in UK mining operations. Within the wider context of action to reduce these accidents, this study examined the potential for an ergonomic contribution to improved safety.Two major aspects were examined. The first, manual handling of supplies was studied since ergonomic methods have proved a successful means of accident reduction in other industries. The second area concerned the topic of behaviourally-related accidents (lack of caution, failure to observe rules, etc) which have, over the years, shown the greatest proportional increase of all accident categories.The studies of manual handling involved detailed physiological and biomechanical assessment of simulated handling tasks derived from underground surveys. Measurements taken included: heart rate, oxygen consumption and intra-abdominal pressure. The results showed that the strain imposed on the workforce was dependent on the weight, size and shape of the material, the lifting technique adopted and the design of the transportation vehicle. Particular avenues for improved safety were identified in relation to both training and vehicle design. The results provide the basis for a reduction in back injuries, using contributions from ergonomists as well as an ergonomic contribution together with the skills from specialists in training, safety and engineering. These studies also repeated some experiments used to establish UK guidelines on manual handling in industry, and demonstrated that the mining workforce may be capable of safe handling beyond the levels published for general industry.The study of behavioural components in accident causation was more exploratory as this area has received little serious attention in industry generally, and in mining in particular. It had two components: first, a detailed recording of near-miss accidents from approximately 200 volunteers within two collieries and second, the use of a battery of psychological assessments which had previously been reported as being related to the causation of accidents.The near-miss survey involved categorising all incidents into three main causal factors: personal, environmental and vehicle/load. Of the three categories, the personal was the most common major factor. A breakdown of this category into errors of recognition, decision and action showed that decision errors were the most frequent.Few useful conclusions were able to be drawn from examing the relationships between psychological assessment and near-miss accidents. However, relationships were shown between stress imposed by recent events in an individual’s life and near-misses, suggesting (as has been shown in other industries) that such stresses, both at home and at work, may predispose an individual to the risk of accident.In summary, the two main themes of this research point to the potential value of safety training, both in the direct reduction of personal injury and in increasing workers’ awareness of the possibility of hazards.