Safety
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Programs | Performance | Recognition | Incident Investigation | Safety Awards
Sadly, Goldcorp had four fatalities in 2011: a veteran underground miner hit by a scoop tram; a contractor hit by a falling rock under an open raise; an experienced drilling contractor hit by a piece of a surface drill that broke under pressure; a young employee caught in an ore conveyance device. All of these incidents have been reviewed by senior management and presented to the SEHS Board Committee.
In addition to implementing immediate corrective actions at the operations where the incidents occurred, the reports were shared with all operations to ensure a similar incident will not happen at other sites.
Clearly we still have work to do to reach our vision of making Goldcorp Safe Enough for Our Families. Executive, senior management, all Goldcorp employees, contractors and our business partners continue to work together to make this a reality.
Programs
To achieve excellence in safety, Goldcorp continues to focus on corporate culture, leading performance indicators, behaviour, and developing and sharing best practices across all operations. Strategies and initiatives aimed at improving safety in 2011 included:
- Continued promotion and senior management support of the Safety Vision for the Company: “Goldcorp: Safe Enough for Our Families”. Videos describing the vision’s three key themes – Care, Think, Act – continue to be distributed to employees and contractors.
- Continued development of safety leadership competencies throughout the corporation via Safety Leadership Training. Over 1,000 managers and supervisors have now taken this three-day course.
- The rollout of DELTA – a safety leadership training program targeted at front-line employees, which is available in English and Spanish. Over 5,000 employees have completed this course.
- Golden Eye safety reviews (conducted in a peer review format), which are carried out to share best practices and assist with risk-mitigation strategies. Six reviews were completed in Canada, the US, Mexico and Guatemala in 2011.
- Benchmarking and sharing industry best practices through the Mining Industry Roundtable on Safety and ICMM. The mission of these organizations is to share practices and strategies to eliminate incidents in the workplace.
- The self-assessment of the risk-based safety management system framework at each operation, which is reviewed independently biannually as part of the Golden Eye process.
- A company-wide Aviation Safety Management System implemented at the operations that use company-owned or charter aviation was tested in 2009, validated in 2010 and audited in 2011.
- Safety and health workshops were held for all regions during the year; over 40 senior safety and health and operations leaders attended the three-day events.
Performance
Overall, Goldcorp continued to improve its safety performance in 2011.
Goldcorp had four fatalities in 2011. Two fatalities were in our Mexico region, one in our United States/Canada region (Canada) and one in our Central/South America region (Guatemala).
| 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total Goldcorp fatalities | 4 (2) | 1 (0) | 1 (0) | 3 (1) | 4 (1) |
| US/Canada region | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Central/South America region | 1 (1) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Mexico region | 2 (1) | 1 | 1 | 3 (1) | 3 (1) |
(Note: Contractor fatalities are in parentheses; e.g., in 2011, two of the four fatalities involved contractors.)
Goldcorp’s AIFR (All Injury Frequency Rate) decreased by 31% and the LTIFR (Lost Time Injury Frequency Rate) decreased by 14% in 2011.
| 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AIFR (200,000 hrs) | 1.82 | 2.63 | 2.89 | 3.39 | 4.26 |
| LTIFR (200,000 hrs) | 0.31 | 0.36 | 0.34 | 0.61 | 0.92 |
Minor injuries such as first aids are not included in AIFR or LTIFR frequency rates. Goldcorp has an established guideline and standard for reporting incidents. The guideline informs operations of when and to whom an incident needs to be reported and provides guidance on determining the severity of the injury. These guidelines and standard are available on the Goldcorp intranet system.
Recognition
Individual operations are proud to share some of their accomplishments from 2011:
Marigold – People recognition was prominent at our Marigold operation. Jerod Eastman, Jesse Danner, Robert Ziegenbien, Monica Standaert and Andrew Smith were all recognized for excellence in Safety and Health by receiving health and safety awards at the Nevada Mining Association Annual Convention in Lake Tahoe.
Marlin – Marlin achieved 2,000,000 hours with no lost time in 2011.
Musselwhite - Musselwhite Mine Rescue Team won their regional mine rescue event and proudly represented Goldcorp at the provincial finals.
Marlin - Marlin made history by sending a mine rescue team to the Ontario Regional mine rescue competition in Red Lake; this was the first time an international team had competed in this event.
Incident Investigation
During 2011, Goldcorp continued to improve the Incident Investigation process across all regions. Nobody wants to have safety-related incidents; however, when they do occur, it is important to learn from our mistakes. Root cause analysis enables us to share the experience across the Company the experience and allows operations to assure that a similar incident cannot occur at their location.
This program engages senior management at the mine and also the senior Operations Leadership (led by the COO) in the investigation process. Each high-potential incident (and actual significant occurrence) is assigned an investigation team with a member of the Operations Leadership Team having a key role. The quality of the investigations has improved significantly in the last year. An outside consultant periodically reviews the reports to assess the ongoing quality.
Safety Awards
Goldcorp annually recognizes the Best Safety Performance and the Most Improved Safety Performance across our operations.
Los Filos – Los Filos, Mexico, became the first mine in Goldcorp’s history to retain the Best Safety Performance award for three consecutive years. Not only did their injury frequency rate remain the lowest in the Company, they also led the way on several key initiatives including their annual Safety, Environmental and CSR Fair, strong operations leadership and ownership for safety, amazing signage and communication for safety, and the introduction of health activities into the daily work routine. As a result of this achievement, they get to keep the award permanently!
Marlin – Marlin, Guatemala, received the Most Improved Safety Award. Incident rates fell by over 70%, they sent a team to participate in the Ontario mine rescue competitions, they piloted a new training initiative for the Company, and their safety management system reached a mature stage of implementation. Overall, 2011 was a year of tremendous improvement by the whole Marlin team.