Fatigue, the mining industry’s sleeping giant

Anyone who questions fatigue in the mining industry especially the bean counters in head office pushing 12 hour days and sleep disruption through night shift really need to go and experience it first hand to understand what it is all about. The answer is to shorten the days to 11 hours max but they wont do this (some do though). Also if they are going to run tests on people they need to compare alcohol free sites like oil rigs to mine sites that freely serve alcohol including takeaways and where people have to get up at 4.45am to make the 5.30 bus to work. Also look at increased obesity on mine sites. Companies put personal trainers on sites now as a form of duty of care but literally in a 700 strong workforce a handfull of people show up as they are just too tired and do not have enough time in the day given the early rise. Studies have proven that a rested workforce is a more efficient less accident prone workforce and hence ultimately more productive. These are the things a spreadsheet doesn't show.

gus | 28 January 2011 at 10:56