Heavy traffic, large equipment, poor visibility and blind spots create the potential for accidents in an industry that demands world-class operational performance and has the expectation of zero harm.

Underground mining Internet of Things (IoT) service provider Newtrax believes its Collision Avoidance System (CAS) will be able to assist miners in improving their health and safety performance.

Speaking during the first day of the virtual Sandvik Innovation in Mining conference, on September 29, the company said its CAS system was inspired by the Earth Moving Equipment Safety Round Table (EMERST) and the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) Vehicle Intervention Roadmap.

Newtrax is aiming to “take the lead” in collision avoidance and is driving its CAS towards level nine of this roadmap, which will virtually eliminate vehicle-to-personnel fatalities.

EMERST levels seven through nine refer to the technology stack to help machine operators prevent accidents, explained Newtrax systems engineering manager Martin Bouchard.

Level seven is for situational awareness, where the system informs the operator that a remote operator is around the vehicle; level eight is for advisory control, where the system uses the remote object, position and travel direction to predict a collision and request an action to be taken by the operator (like slow down or stop); and level nine is for intervention controls, which allows the system to automatically slow down or stop the vehicle if required when, for example, the operator fails to act on a level eight alarm.

Bouchard said the CAS used peer-to-peer communication technology and that there was no reliance on continuous communication or positioning infrastructure.

The system was also deployed in stages to help with change management and to minimise the impact on production at a mining operation, he added.

At first, the system will operate in passive monitoring mode, from where the IoT hub analyses interactions and where they happen so that it can enable mine management to change traffic patterns, or train specific operators and pedestrians.

During the second stage, a notification system is enabled, which warns operators and pedestrians when they come too close to the equipment. The intervention control is enabled automatically during the third stage of deployment.

Newtrax product manager Patrice Corneau noted that reporting was an essential component of the Newtrax CAS solution, as “it provides a feedback loop and is critical to report near misses and proximity-related incidents”.

For example, a Newtrax three-dimensional heat map in the CAS system’s IoT hub provides a wealth of information that enables the operation to focus on priorities, address improvement and implement corrective actions within specific locations, based on the magnitude of the specific phenomenon, or incident.

The solution is also compatible with autonomous equipment, Bouchard pointed out, noting that the technology was “designed to work effectively with autonomous vehicles and especially with pedestrians”.

Every vehicle within a mining operation can be equipped with a CAS, said Corneau, “so that every worker can fully rely on the solution and feel safe”.

“Our strength is to integrate with any branded model of vehicle, from data collection to controlling the vehicle, the Newtrax CAS can be installed on any on-the-ground machines, large or small,” he explained, noting that the intervention control function not only supported original-equipment manufacturers like Sandvik, but “any vehicle with spring-applied and hydrobraking systems”.