WORKSAFE Victoria says Impact Drilling has been convicted and fined $80,000 after it detonated explosives close to a vehicle and worker.
WorkSafe Victoria says its investigation of the May 2007 incident at the Mernda Village housing estate in Melbourne identified a ‘litany’ of safety failings which could have caused a fatality.
The incident in question was caught on a video which had been taken for insurance purposes.
Impact Drilling pleaded guilty to two charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act.
The company had been carrying out the blasting in order to prepare trenches for sewer lines because the land contained rock. The court was told a blast management plan required by the Australian Standard was not produced and the shot firer was working outside his qualifications.
Blast management plans identify risks and hazards, and what has to be done to mitigate them. They specify the proposed dates and times of blasting, warning procedures as well as details of traffic management plans and exclusion zones.
Inadequate communications between site sentries and the shot-firer was identified as one of the reasons for the safety failing.
An asphalt truck entered the area where blasting was to be done, so a sentry drove out to warn the other driver who immediately left the area. The shot firer saw the asphalt truck leave, but that he could not see the entire blast zone because parts of it were obscured by piles of earth.
The charge was detonated without warning, with the sentry’s vehicle about 55m away from the source of the explosion. Rock flew through the air, striking the vehicle and smashing the windscreen. The utility driver who was walking back to it ran and was lucky not to be hurt.
According to a WorkSafe inspector an exclusion zone of 300 metres was required for the work done that day.
A video of the incident can be seen below, with the explosion occurring in the last part of the footage.