Virtual haulage trucks: Improving the safety of surface mines

Surface mines are in operation worldwide, the vast majority employ large haul trucks for the transfer of material both to the outside world and around the site. The sheer size of these trucks and the operating conditions means there is a high level of risk. Allied to this, the commercial nature of the operation means that down time is extremely costly and driver training expensive. The AIMS Research Unit has developed a number of PC based Virtual Reality (VR) systems to improve employee training. These are currently being developed into commercial applications. This paper will discuss two of these applications, a VR surface mine truck driving simulator and the application of a generalised hazard awareness training system to a truck inspection scenario. In the truck driving simulator, scenarios are created by importing site specific data through industrial CAD systems, road systems are then added through an editor to create good replicas of the environment facing drivers on a day-to-day basis. Allowing the user to specify a number of intelligent objects including haulage trucks, excavators with load points and various static objects further enhances the virtual world. The truck inspection application demonstrates the need to train staff in how to spot hazards, understand what may happen in the future, identify probabilities and understand remedial measures. Once scenarios have been created training is carried out on a full screen real-time simulation which allows trainees to move freely around the truck performing a preshift inspection. At any given point the trainee is able to identify potential hazards, their associated risk, and take possible corrective action.