Cradle to grave
Mobility becomes mainstream
The advent of the digital era means that people are empowered to perform what was previously regarded as‘ desk duties’ anytime, anywhere.
In a first for Anglo American South Africa, its Zibulo colliery in Mpumalanga introduced outbye Wi-Fi infrastructure and smartphones to revolutionise communication underground. This development has rapidly evolved with the introduction of a series of mobile apps that optimise productivity, speed up decisionmaking, and give employees the information they need, when and where they need it.
This technology was first trialled in 2016 and the full outbye implementation was concluded in June 2017.“ The fixed underground telephones previously in use were unreliable and reaching them would often require a long walk. Employees would frequently need to return to the surface to get a message to a colleague, report a problem, or access production-critical information,” says Zanne-Mari Meyer, business improvement manager at Anglo.
“ Smartphones have changed all this. They enable instant communication from underground to the surface, from the surface underground, and from one underground location to the other, but— at their core— they are tools that can be used for so much more,” she adds.
Two hundred frontline employees are equipped with devices that look and work the same way as an ordinary smartphone. They are, however, intrinsically safe and designed to withstand harsh conditions.
Apart from being able to make voice calls via an app called CSIP Simple, employees can use Cisco Spark to send text messages and photographs. They can send and receive documents like policies, procedures, and section plans.
“ In the past, foremen would sometimes only get around to reporting a machine fault at the end of a shift— now they can get in touch with the responsible people on the spot. And send an accompanying photograph of the issue!” says Meyer.
Work management has also been made more efficient with an app called Fewzion. Underground personnel are able to view all tasks scheduled for the day on the screen, tick them off once they have been completed, and provide status updates on work in progress. At the same time, the supervisor on the surface has an accurate picture of how work is progressing.
The Power BI app provides live data that could previously only be retrieved via the control room. This means that key personnel have round-the-clock access to critical information
that can either prevent or immediately address unnecessary downtime.
Smartphones will increasingly play a role in safety and are already being used to capture underground visible felt leadership interactions on Enablon— a software the company uses to manage and track environmental and social performance. Moreover, the colliery will soon be trialling a checklist app to provide assurance on the quality of the pre-start check. The phone, in conjunction with near-field communication tags on both machines and employee clock cards, will verify the presence of team members during the exercise while flagged issues will go directly into a database for actioning.
The app, to be trialled on behalf of Anglo American, will be fully customisable and can be adopted by a variety of departments for multiple functions. The innovation will soon be rolled out at Goedehoop and Greenside collieries later this year.
“ Underground mobility is enabling us to move the mining industry into the digital era and empower our frontline leaders to make informed decisions regarding productivity. This revolutionary technology also provides for real-time reporting of safety incidents,” concludes Meyer.
ROTHENBERGER TOOLS S. A. For more than 60 years, ROTHENBERGER has been a worldwide leader in producing innovative, technologically demanding pipe tools and machines for lavatory, climate-control, gas and environmental technology.
[ 52 ] MINING MIRROR SEPTEMBER 2018
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