The International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) has released its annual safety data report, which collates the safety data of nearly 900,000 people. The report recorded 63 fatalities in 2016.
Six member companies (out of 23 in total) recorded no fatalities for the year and there was a decrease in the number of incidents resulting in fatalities. However, there was in increase in the total number of fatalities from 60 in 2015.
There was a decrease in the number of recordable injuries, from 10,494 to 8,445.
All of the data is set against a lower number of hours worked in 2016, which fell by 11% over the previous year. In order to accurately measure the frequency of fatalities and injuries, the report measures their occurrence per million hours worked.
The fatality rate for 2016 was 0.032 in 2016, an increase over the 2015 figure of 0.027, while the rate of injuries was reduced from 4.70 to 4.26 injuries per million hours worked.
The report findings include:
- Three additional fatalities recorded in 2016 compared to 2015
- A decrease in the number of fatal incidents
- Six member companies recorded no fatalities in 2016
- Nearly half of fatalities (31) were due to fall of ground in underground mines (18) and transportation/mobile equipment (15)
- In 2016, there were 2,049 fewer recordable injuries
- A 9.36% reduction in recorded injuries per million hours worked
The report also examines incidents by country and found that 24 of the 63 fatalities occurred in South Africa, seven in Chile and seven in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
