TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Toronto-based Vale Canada, which owns and operates the Stobie underground mine, near Sudbury, was on Tuesday fined a record C$1.05-million for the death of two men at the operation on June 8, 2011.

Vale Canada pleaded guilty to three charges, namely failing to prevent the movement of material through an ore pass while hazardous conditions existed; failing to maintain the drain holes at the 2 400 ft level of the mine, leading to the accumulation of water, creating wet muck which then hung up; and failing to ensure that water, slimes and other wet material was not dumped into the ore pass at the 2 600 ft level.

Vale was fined $350 000 for each count, which amounted to the highest ever total fine levied by a court in Ontario for contraventions of the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

A Ministry of Labour investigation had found that there had been a hang-up of wet muck in the ore pass, which was the result of Vale not dealing with water issues in the mine.

The investigation had found that on the night shift two workers, Jason Chenier (35) and Jordan Fram (26), were working at an ore pass on the 3 000 ft level, in the process of transferring broken rock and ore (muck) from above that level to below that level through a transfer gate.

The workers were operating the gate using a remote control pendant. Despite there being a protected area for workers at that location, in order to view the movement of muck and use the remote pendant, the two workers had to position themselves such that they were in front of and fully exposed to the transfer gate.

There was then a sudden and uncontrolled release of muck, sand, and water through the transfer gate, burying one worker and hitting the other.

Both workers died from massive crush injuries and multiple blunt force trauma.

Justice Randall Lalande imposed the fine, and the court also imposed a 25% victim fine surcharge, as required by the Provincial Offences Act, which would be credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.

"There is no higher priority than the safety of our people. We have concentrated significant efforts and resources on understanding what happened at Stobie mine on June 8, 2011, and we have come very far in terms of implementing the recommendations that were made following this incident.

"We continue to put in place measures to make our plants and mines as safe as possible," Vale said in an emailed statement.

"Although the court proceedings have now been concluded, as a company we cannot and will not ever forget what happened. We have a responsibility to the families, our employees, our company and our community ...  to ensure we do everything we can to prevent this or any other tragedy from occurring in our operations again," Vale VP for Ontario/UK operations Kelly Strong said.