A Rio Tinto spokesperson said no people were in the vicinity and no-one was injured, but union secretary Greg Busson said five staff were further down the line working on the stationary equipment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Iron ore trains can be several kilometres long and Mr Busson confirmed the group were unharmed, but said they were shaken by the incident.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said if workers were closer to the site of the crash the consequences could have been far more serious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“[They were working] in the dark in an isolated area, and even though they were a bit away from where the incident happened they were still at risk and it’s obviously shaken them,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“They could have been at the other end of the train. It could have been far worse.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator (ONRSR) has launched an investigation and yesterday said it received a report about a collision between a loaded ore train and a recovery train.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The recovery train is reported to have collided with the ore train it was sent to recover after it was disabled by a mechanical failure,” a spokesman said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The spokesman said in its early stages the investigation would focus on the operation of and adherence to signalling systems in the area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr Busson said the workers were undertaking a “train rescue” on the equipment that had failed and only escaped harm after a mayday signal was issued minutes before the crash occurred.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Driverless trucks, trains, and drills are gradually replacing manual and often dangerous mining jobs in WA’s north.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n He accepted the mayday signal showed safety fail-safes had worked, but said it was unsafe to rely on emergency measures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “On this occasion it did work. It was a welcome back-up, but you can’t rely on that all the time,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is understood work to remediate the site commenced on Monday night and will continue today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is the second Rio Tinto derailment in the Pilbara this year and the third in the past 12 months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An empty autonomous train left the tracks about 120km from Dampier in February.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRobots taking over in Pilbara<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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