More Safety. Less Oops. That’s IMPACT
PAUL GRIFFIN, Operations Manager for Impact Drill & Blast (a sponsor at the March 2021 CMPA Critical Incidents workshop) provides a report on the comprehensive safety management system in place on all aspects of the business. (Associate Member of the CMPA since 2004).
At Impact Drill & Blast, we do what it takes to make a positive IMPACT on your business.
Everyone, from the front office to the front line believes in doing better, searching for unconventional solutions to improve safety, reduce costs, abbreviate timelines (without taking shortcuts), and boost the overall business performance of your company.
New technologies such as electronic detonators, drone surveying, GPS guided drills, and our high energy RedStar emulsion have seen our customers report not only greater safety but better quality fines at less cost (up to 20%) in shorter time spans. That’s win-win-win.
Impact Drill & Blast is the amalgamation of four family-owned businesses: Caruana Blasting in Central Queensland, Sequel Drilling in South East Queensland, Impact Drill & Blast in Victoria and NorthStar Blasting in the Northern Territory. Our network also includes RedBull Powder Company, New Zealand’s’ largest drilling and blasting contractor. Impact’s breadth and width is supported by depth. Our parent company, Yahua Industrial
Group, is listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange and has a market cap of AUD$2.6 billion.
Impact Drill & Blast has been an Associate member of the CMPA since 2004 and has been involved in many CMPA workshops, annual dinners and made valuable contributions to CMPA guidelines and checklists in relation to different aspects of the blasting process in quarries.
Impact’s number one priority is to ensure our people go home safely after work every day.
Impact Drill & Blast has a comprehensive safety management system to manage all aspects of our operations. The system provides the process for development of documentation for inductions, employee training, risk management, operational procedures and company policies that are used across the business.
Last year, Impact launched its new safety initiative – Safety STRONG. This program was developed by Deborah Keep and is a frontline team owned and run program designed to build safety as part of our culture and create safety minded employees. We recognise safety as the company value that underpins everything that we do, and we needed to ensure that our teams have the skills to lead safety.
The program has three key areas:
Safety SELF – Individuals take accountability
Safety TEAM – Teams collectively commit
Safety LEAD – Leaders create the right conditions
Safety in blasting
Impact is using new technologies to make blasting environments
much safer.
- Drone surveying
Impact has been using drones to do profile surveying of benches for many years. This saves hours of walking the bench with a GPS rover. Less personnel hours on the bench = less risk.
2. Electronic detonators
Through our exclusive partnership with Davey Bickford ENAEX, Impact decided to break ranks with the norm and commit to convert 100% of their blasting to electronic detonators. The change has delivered better safety on the bench as it has removed the risk of slap, snap and shoot incidents of NONEL detonators and, more importantly, it has delivered exceptional blasting outcomes to our customers.
3. RedStar emulsion
RedStar Emulsion is Impact’s patented explosive product. The unique high energy emulsion formulation, in conjunction with electronic detonators, allows Impact to optimise design and deliver superior blasting outcomes. RedStar has shown to be 15% more efficient in blasting, which means less holes in the ground. Less holes in the ground = less activity = less risk.
4. O-Pitblast
O-Pitblast is an innovative blasting and design software system used by Impact. It allows us to design optimal blasting patterns, even in technically challenging areas, and run firing simulation. Drone survey, face profiling and bore tracking information is loaded into the program to provide the most accurate data for designing the safest and most efficient blast. Safer blasts = less risk
5. GPS guided drills
Impact is now using the latest technology from Sandvik – GPS guided drills. Removes the need for people to walk the bench and put dots on the ground. Auto-drill technology increases productivity and improves operator safety. Ability to send and receive data from the drill while it is drilling, e.g., changes to drill pattern. Less time on the ground = less risk
To Get in touch ring 1800 2 IMPACT or
email: info@impactdrillblast.com
You must be logged in to post a comment Login