In Brief

The Search for Tools to Make Mines Safer

After four mining accidents in January and early February killed 16 people in West Virginia and one in Kentucky, experts are studying whether technology can help prevent fatalities

By Grant Gross

April 01, 2006 — CSO —

Workplace Safety

After four mining accidents in January and early February killed 16 people in West Virginia and one in Kentucky, experts are studying whether technology can help prevent fatalities. The big question: Which technologies can do the most good?

Investment in mine safety technology has lagged for years, partly because the government hasn't pushed for improvements. Regulations instead focus on training and accident prevention, says Keith Pauley, CEO of the nonprofit Mid-Atlantic Technology, Research & Innovation Center (Matric). "The legislators think that if they prevent an accident, it's better than reacting afterward," he says.

Meanwhile, the mining industry has been "lulled to sleep" by decreasing accident rates, says R. Larry Grayson, a professor of mining engineering at the University of Missouri-Rolla. Since 1990, U.S. mine fatalities have declined by almost 67 percent, according to the National Mining Association. But 2006 reversed the trend, Grayson says.

The association asked Grayson, a former coal mine manager, to head an independent commission to examine which technologies could help. And the West Virginia legislature passed a bill requiring wireless communications inside mines. In the Sago mine explosion in Tallmansville, where 12 miners died, fire damaged a wireline communications system, leaving the miners without a way to talk to the surface. Most U.S. mines use some type of wireline system.

Other technologies have potential to improve mine safety. But even the best options are far from perfect, says Matt Ward, managing director of Varis Mine Technology. Varis makes communications products such as "leaky feeder" cables, which transmit wireless voice, video and data even if damaged in a mine collapse or fire. Ultra-low frequency text-messaging would be wireless, but it works only one way (surface to mine).

Matric has proposed that mines use sensors to monitor miners' vital signs and radio frequency identification systems to track vehicles. Grayson says the solution is a mix of technologies, but the approach can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars per mine.