Roobuck’s Project – Southern Mines Rescue HQ (Woonona NSW – a Division of Coal Services)

Overview

As a legislated emergency service provider for the NSW coal industry, Mines Rescue is responsible for maintaining a competent brigade of rescue personnel. In the event of an incident at a mine site, they provide expert advice and supply necessary rescue equipment.

Mines Rescue operates five state-of-the-art Mines Rescue and training facilities within NSW. All Rescue sites require miners’ cap lamps as mandatory PPE for first responders attending to mine site incidents. This also requires the need for vehicle fit outs for backup cap lamps on hot stand by.

The Challenge

In 2019, Mines Rescue were using older models of corded cap lamps, which had become unreliable and costly to replace. They had also been using Roobuck’s KH3E-Ex cordless cap lamps for a number of years to cater for varied underground mine conditions. However, both these cap lamps were becoming dated, hence, the decision was made for an all-sites review to invest in a technology upgrade.

Mines Rescue went to market to find the best solution. As a valued long-term supporter of Coal Services, Roobuck was invited to respond to provide an all-sites standardized solution. The brief was “value for money and best fit technology” to meet their demanding operational needs for intense operations, such as Rescue/Emergency Response and Firefighting. In addition, a special requirement was the ability for the cap lamps to be installed and charged in Mines Rescue Response Vehicles. A number of competing products were considered.

The Solution

All sites were offered our latest cordless cap lamp KC3E-Ex, for coal mines, and the associated CB8E charging bank.

CB8E Charging Bank for Response Vehicles
Roobuck’s CB8E 8-unit charging bank is ideally suited and designed for vehicle mounting. It charges using a vehicle’s 12/24VDC charging port or a 240VAC portable power source. It is an ideal solution for Emergency Responders onsite who need “grab and go” cap lamps with the capability of continuous cap lamp swap outs for rotational charging during the demands of extended operations.

The Outcome

After assessing various market options, Mines Rescue made a business decision based on the above decision factors to proceed with the KC3E-Ex cordless cap lamp and progressively rolled out the solution to all five sites.
The KC3E-Ex was recently superseded by the KC4E-Ex, which has higher battery capacity, brighter light and stronger casing material.