Safety and health

Emergency contacts

Your area focal point has the numbers for the nearest health centre and transport. Save them in your phone today.

Pit and shaft safety

Before work

• Check walls and supports every morning, and again after any rain.
• Do not enter if you see cracks, loose soil, water seeping or bulging walls.
• One person always stays at the top and knows who is below.
• Keep a strong rope and a ladder at every shaft.

While working

• Support walls with timber in any shaft deeper than your own height.
• Never dig under an overhang.
• Keep spoil heaps at least two metres back from the edge of the pit.
• Wear a helmet and boots if you have them; the association can help with equipment.
• Do not work underground after drinking alcohol.

Bad air

Deep or old shafts can hold air with too little oxygen, or with smoke and fumes from engines. If you feel dizzy, get a headache or find it hard to breathe, climb out at once. Never run a generator or water pump inside a shaft. If someone collapses below, do not go down after them without a rope tied around you and people at the top to pull you out.

Old and abandoned pits

Fill, fence or mark them. Most deaths of children and animals at mine sites happen in open pits that nobody is using.

Mercury

• Try mercury-free methods first: careful panning, sluices with carpet or mats, and shaking tables. Ask your focal point about training.
• If mercury is still used, never burn amalgam in or near a home, or near children or pregnant women.
• Use a retort to capture mercury when heating. Stand upwind.
• Never use cooking pots for mercury, and never handle it with bare hands.
• Keep mercury out of rivers, wells and fish ponds.

First aid

Bleeding

Press firmly on the wound with a clean cloth and keep pressing. Raise the injured arm or leg if you can. Get help.

Broken bones and back injuries

Do not move someone who may have a back or neck injury unless they are in danger where they are. Keep them still and warm, and send for help.

Someone not breathing after a fall or bad air

Get them to fresh air safely. Call for help. If trained, start chest compressions: push hard and fast in the centre of the chest.

Keep a first aid box at every site

Clean cloths and bandages, gloves, clean water, and a list of phone numbers. Your focal point can tell you how to get one.

Health at the site

Malaria

Standing water in old pits breeds mosquitoes. Sleep under a treated net, cover or drain standing water, and get tested quickly if you have fever.

HIV and sexual health

Mining camps with many people far from home carry a higher risk of HIV. Use condoms, and get tested regularly. Testing and treatment are free at government health centres.

Clean water and dust

Drink only boiled or treated water. Crushing ore creates fine dust that damages the lungs over time: wet the ore before crushing and cover your nose and mouth.

This guide is general information and does not replace training by a qualified person.