Safety award for Boart Longyear

Michael Layton (l) and Jim Nelson (r) of Boart Longyear with the SMA Safety Award. — Photo courtesy Boart Longyear

Boart Longyear, the world’s leading supplier of drilling services and equipment for mining and drilling companies, recently took home the 2014 Saskatchewan Mining Association's safety award for achieving an injury rating of zero in its Saskatchewan drilling operations last year.

The SMA rating is achieved by calculating the Lost Time Injury (LTI) and Modified Work Injury (MWI) frequency rate plus 10 per cent of the LTI and MWI severity rate.

The award is doubly impressive, seeing as the majority of Boart Longyear’s operations in Saskatchewan take place underground in the province’s uranium mines, located approximately 800 kilometres north of Saskatoon. With 90 crew members operating 11 rigs around the clock seven days a week, that’s 170,000 man-hours without so much as a scratch. The average industry rating is 2.2 injuries per 200,000 man-hours.

“This is a significant accomplishment for Boart Longyear, and it’s another example of the good outcomes that can result from the efforts of operational and safety teams living and breathing safety as a culture,” said Terry Kirkey, general manager of drilling services in North America. “We are proud of our team’s dedication to safety and congratulate them on this prestigious industry award.”

Despite the additional dangers posed by mining uranium, such as radiation exposure, Boart Longyear’s environment, health and safety training advisor Michael Layton said working in such mines is safe because it’s so highly regulated. The measures taken to ensure worker safety include canisters that monitor dust particles in the air, gamma ray monitors, and daily radiation dose monitors.

“It’s really about maintaining good housekeeping,” Layton said. “Workers follow proper hygiene before they eat, they eat in a refuge station, or come up to the surface, depending on the mine’s policies.”

Boart Longyear drilling site. — Photo courtesy Boart Longyear

Layton said Boart Longyear’s record is the result of three years of working to change the culture within the company. They have taken a safety-first approach to drilling, which means striving for zero injuries, zero illnesses, and zero environmental incidents.

“We’ve really been encouraging our guys to own the program," Layton said. "Instead of worrying about the safety guys coming and picking apart their sites, they take pride in having a good, clean, safe setup. Our leadership team, operations managers, supervisors, they’re all fully on board. When that’s the case, the message gets down to the field level with more power.”

Empowering workers to speak up if they encounter unsafe practices is another key part of the process.

“They have the right to say no. We tell them if it’s not safe, stop,” said Layton, who also credits the mines they work with for helping them achieve their zero rating goal. “We have really good relationships with the companies we work for. For them, safety is the utmost as well.”

Protecting workers also protects the bottom line.

“Every injury costs the company in higher workers’ compensation rates and premiums, travel costs, medical expenses, retraining and down time on the rig until you find a replacement,” Layton said. “Achieving no incidents saves the company a lot of money.”

Most of all, though, it’s good for the people on the front lines.

“Some of our guys have been on the same site for seven to eight years and have developed close relationships,” Layton said. “It’s kind of a family, and to see no one go out injured does a lot for the guys. It’s great for morale. All of us on the leadership team take a lot of pride in this award. It’s taken a lot of work to get to this level, so it’s nice to see that hard work pay off.”