With the global mining industry moving towards the legislated adoption of Proximity Detection Systems (PDS), they are becoming a critical control measure for improving safety in mobile mining equipment. PDS technology works to detect people and vehicles in the vicinity of an enabled vehicle and sounds an alarm for an impending hazard. In certain systems, the PDS is able to take control and initiate last-line-of-defence measures such as stopping the vehicle during an impending collision. Interactions covered include vehicle-to-vehicle, vehicle-to-person, and vehicle-to-structure.
However, effective implementation of such technologies to-date are rare due to a general lack of understanding (or misconception) of the technology’s true capabilities and limitations, the implications of the technology on operator/operational behaviour, change management issues and the industry’s general inexperience.
Reliability and functionality claims made by suppliers are not easily verifiable by the end user, at least not relative to any known framework, methodology, or standard. Additionally, there are many PDS units and multiple sensing technology categories used such as radio frequency, infrared, radar, ultrasonic, LIDAR, and combinations thereof. Sites can be further confounded when selecting a PDS unit because little is known about the actual strengths and weaknesses or what is effective/ineffective relative to specific operating conditions.
This leaves mining companies ill-equipped to decide which system type and functionality is best suited to their particular needs. Simply put, mining companies and suppliers do not have a consistent assessment protocol available to put the systems through their paces to determine how well a particular system might work for a given site.
