Ontario’s mining industry in 1989 had the lowest injury rate ever recorded in its history, reports the Mines Accident Prevention Association Ontario (MAPAO). Injuries requiring medical attention fell to 16.8 per 200,000 employee hours from 18.8 in 1988. The rate of injuries resulting in lost time dropped 21% to 2.6 from 3.3 of 1988, or less than half the rate of five years ago.
Tentative figures for compensable injuries in Ontario’s mining industry till September, 1989, were 4.03 per 200,000 employee hours, compared with 6.66 in all the province’s other industries combined.
“This is only the latest example of the steady downward trend in accident rates over the past 15 years in the Ontario mining industry,” says Graham Ross, president of MAPAO. “Mining now has a lower rate of lost time injuries than the average for all other industries in the province.”
The nickel sector was the leading performer, with a 26% improvement in an injury rate that was already among the lowest in the mining industry. Ross also praises the diamond drill and mine contractors for “another year of substantial reductions in their injury rate.” Historically, both sectors have had injury rates above the industry’s average, but improved their performance last year by an average of about 15%.
“We’ve made such progress in the last decade that our challenge in the ’90s will be to maintain that rate of progress.”
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