A COAL miner known as Worker Y told investigators he'd regularly experienced dusty conditions at Hunter mine sites since starting in the industry in 1980.
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He was "black from head to toe with dust" at Newvale No.1 Colliery in the 1980s, he told the NSW Resources Regulator after tests from 2014 confirmed he had a condition the mining industry believed was a thing of the past - coal worker pneumoconiosis (CSW), or black lung disease.
His formal diagnosis in 2017 sent a shock through the NSW industry, which believed its standards protected workers from a condition that had suddenly re-emerged in Queensland.
The Resources Regulator's investigation of Worker Y, released this week, is disturbing reading for Hunter coal miners. Worker Y was exposed to "numerous airborne dust environments" at work, but not away from work.
He worked on longwalls at Dartbrook Colliery for a decade from 1996 and was "exposed to recorded dust exceedances" during that time. He worked at four mines until 2006, including 13 years at Newvale No. 1 Colliery from 1980s and a brief stint of one month at a Queensland mine. He also worked at a power station for one month.
While records showed no dust exceedances recorded at Newvale while Worker Y was there, he said dust was so prevalent it was evident when he cleared his nose and throat.
At the dusty Cumnock Colliery for a short stint during the mid 1990s Worker Y was given a paper filter dust mask to deal with conditions. The Resources Regulator found Cumnock twice failed exposure limits for dust and quartz during this period.
Records show Worker Y failed a dust exposure test at Dartbrook in April, 1998, despite wearing airstream helmet protection. They also show Dartbrook recorded 201 dust exposure and 16 quartz dust exposure exceedances between 1994 and 2001. In 2002 one worker recorded a quartz exposure eight times the limit, and in 2006 a worker had a dust exposure five times the limit.
While Dartbrook was the subject of "significant attention" by regulators, the mine demonstrated "a failure to deal with issues causing the exceedances". Dartbrook closed in December, 2006 but there are new attempts to resume mining at the site.
The Worker Y case is both a personal tragedy and an industry warning.
Issue: 39,217.
