Cargill SaltMining Incidents in 2017

All power to all surface and underground operations were lost due to a Cleveland Public Power equipment failure at an offsite substation that supplies power to the west side of the city.

#3 hoist load cells lost calibration during test trip that started at 5:30am. Troubleshooting began at 5:56am. GL Tiley was contacted via phone while third shift was evacuating the mine with the emergency hoist. Load cells were re-calibrated at the right values and another test trip was performed with success. First shift went down at 8:05am.

Production Hoist braking system would not release. The Hoist was deemed out of service, evac was called, and MSHA was notified.

The production hoist went down and could not be reset. Troubleshooting began and a fault in the #2 drive was identified. The fault was corrected, test runs were performed, and the hoist was put back into operation.

Hoist was bringing employee out of mine when it tripped out. Troubleshooting began, Tiley was contacted & asked us to try connections on control board. Switched from fiber to ethernet connection, communication was reestablished & hoist was able to be reset, employee was brought to surface. Testing continued, ran full test trip, everything tested ok.

During normal operation of the hoisting system the deflection wheel broke free from its mounts and became displaced. This caused a misalignment of hoist head ropes.

#3 hoist tripped out and would not move from the collar position. Cycling power to the drive was needed in order to get the hoist to move. The drive was returned to all original parts following the changes that had been made the night prior while troubleshooting. The hoist operated normally following the changes.

Employee was preparing to send supplies underground via the #3 hoist. As soon as the operator moved the hoist's joystick to send the cage underground the hoist tripped out. Shortly after this MSHA was notified. After several hours of troubleshooting it was found that there was a broken lug on the DC loop breaker.

The production hoist tripped out on a heartbeat fault and could not be reset.

Production hoist was out of service due to a PLC loss of communication.

Lost power feed from Cleveland Public Power to both Hoists.

Sending supplies into the mine via the #3 cage w/ 5 ton overhead hoist. The material sled was halfway out of the cage at the landing when the springs around the chain/hook assembly became entangled in the hook causing the chain to not properly pass through the hook. The sled could not be freed initially causing the #3 hoist to be inoperable.

A phase was lost on the power pole that supplies power to the production hoist. The loss of phase caused the production hoist cool fan motors for the hoist converters to fail.

The production hoist W2 pinion brake would not release.

Our facility experienced a power surge causing the power to trip in areas underground and on surface. The Tiley Brake Regulator (TBR) unit in #1 hoist tripped at this time. This caused the #1 hoist to be down for 30+ minutes until it could be reset. The unit was reset and the hoist was running again by 1:45am.

A Hydraulic line on the south east brake unit of the production hoist failed.

Hoist operator was hoisting in auto when the hoist stopped with the South skip loaded at the bottom bc of a brake fault. The operator reset the fault and attempted to lower the loaded skip. After several attempts the operator called for help. It was found that the operator did not realize that the South was in the bottom and was attempting to go the wrong direction.

While # 3 hoist operator was doing a full test trip, the load cell system failed to work. GL Tiley was called as well as MSHA. After investigation, GL Tiley raised the set point of the system up to 7,800 lbs and achieved the load cell fault every time. #3 was back up and running at 12:52am (3/9/17). No evacuation because no one was in the mine at the time of this incident.

During #3 hoist test trip, the load cell did not trip as expected. Supervisor decided to evacuate the mine via the chippy. MSHA and GL Tiley were contacted. GL Tiley discovered that the slack rope was not being bypassed in the system which caused the load cell to not trip. They made an adjustment and tested it twice successfully. Hoist was operational and running at 11:35pm.

Sunday night, #3 hoist skip was found to not sound right. It was noticed that the brass slider on the back side of the dogs was twisted and bent causing the dog to bind and not retract. The mine was evacuated and the dog replaced. A full shaft inspection was done prior to send people underground, no damage was found to the guides.

An employee damaged the service cage header while unloading materials. The employee tried to make the repairs but when unable, ee reported the incident to the Mill operator. The Mill operator relayed the message to the on shift maintenance supervisor. The supervisor traveled to the area, inspected the damage, and decided to down the hoist for repairs.

While in the process of installing chain hangers an employee drilled into a small pocket of methane. The employee stopped work and called the supervisor. All work was stopped in the unit, power was de-energized, ventilation was increased, and MSHA was notified.

Around 11am 1 ladder rung was found to be broken in the #3 mancage. The ladder is used to exit the cage in case of emergency. The decision was made to evac the mine until the ladder could be repaired. The ladder was repaired by 12pm thus cancelling the evac.

During the test trip of 2 hoist the load cell fault did not trip the hoist when chairing the cage as it should have. The weight was not low enough to trip the hoist. GL Tiley was called and remotely adjusted and installed skip weight offset in load cell input data. This was essentially recalibrating the load cells allowing the 2 hoist to work correctly.

At the end of the shift the hoist operator was not able to get the brakes on #3 hoist to release. The supervisor was called and they began to troubleshoot. When it was realized that it would take more than 30 minutes to correct MSHA was notified. The issue was the pumps were building pressure but the brakes would not release.

Core hole drilling was taking place at the unit 10 drill site. While an employee was in the process of reattaching the quill rod to the drill string a piece of core rock unexpectedly exited the end of the drill steel and ricocheted off of the drill structure contacting the employee in the left side of the neck causing a deep laceration that required treatment.

EE was removing a drill rod from a drill. EE was holding the drill rod on the very end instead of the middle. When the threads finished the rod fell to the ground jolting EE's left elbow. This inflamed tendonitis in EE's elbow. EE was shown stretches and released to full duty until the injection on 6-13-17.

Employee was making holes in an old belt used for skirting in NW2B/NW2A transfer. Employee was wearing gloves and used a hole punch with a 3 lb hammer to cut holes. Employee was in the process of driving the punch through the belt when the hammer struck their left thumb. Tip of the left thumb was broken.

As the bolter wrench was tightening the bolt in the hole, the bolt was a spinner and did not properly take in the hole. As the wrench was lowered, the bolt came almost all the way out of the hole. When employee reached up to pull the bolt out of the roof by hand (with gloves), it fell out of the roof and pinched the employee's left ring finger. Employee received 3 stitches.