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Wawa to host District Mine Rescue Competitions next week

 

May 1, 2018 @ 08:37

A Mine Rescue team competing at the MMCC in 2010.

Mine rescue teams in seven districts across Ontario, including Thunder Bay and Algoma districts, will test their emergency response knowledge and skills in District Mine Rescue Competitions May 10 and 11.

Four teams and equipment technicians from Thunder Bay and Algoma districts will compete at the Michipicoten Memorial Community Centre in Wawa.

Competing teams are:

  •  Barrick Gold – Hemlo-Williams Mine 
  •  Wesdome Gold Mines – Eagle River Mine 
  •  Alamos Gold – Island Gold Mine 
  •  North American Palladium – Lac des Iles Mine (2017 district winner) 

The competition organized by Ontario Mine Rescue, a part of Workplace Safety North, will test the teams’ knowledge, firefighting skills, first aid response, use of emergency equipment and decision-making ability under stress in a simulated underground emergency.

The public and media are welcome to attend district and provincial competitions to give communities a chance to see highly trained volunteers in action. Other competitions will take place in Thunder Bay, Levack, Caledonia, and Timmins.

The winner of each district competition will compete in the 2018 Provincial Competition, June 4 to 8, at Alamos Gold’s Young-Davidson Mine in Matachewan near Kirkland Lake.

Mine rescue competitions, which started in Ontario in 1950, are as much intensive learning opportunities as a chance to test emergency response capabilities. The competitions ensure that mine rescue volunteers across the province are trained to the same high standards.

Mine rescue team members, the backbone of Ontario Mine Rescue, are volunteer mine workers trained by Mine Rescue Officers to respond to all types of mine emergencies including fires, explosions and falls of ground.

Under the authority of the Occupational Health and Safety Act and headquartered in Sudbury, Ontario Mine Rescue staffs, equips and maintains a network of mine rescue stations across the province that ensure mines within a specified geographic area have adequate emergency response capability.

Ontario Mine Rescue is a part of Workplace Safety North, which provides products and services to promote workplace health and safety in the mining, forestry, and paper, printing and converting industries, as well as workplaces across Ontario.

(photos courtesy of Wawa-news.com archives)

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