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$662,102

BC Works ordered to pay up following March incident
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A guided tour of the new Rio Tinto’s BC Works facility. (File photo)

Rio Tinto BC Works has been slapped with the biggest fine ever issued by WorkSafeBC following an incident at the smelter earlier this year.

The $662,102 fine was issued on July 19 following an investigation by WorkSafeBC into an incident involving two employees inside a gas treatment centre reactor.

BC Works employee union Unifor Local 2301’s business agent Cliff Madsen said the March incident involved two management personnel.

“Mistakes were made and [the personnel] ended up trapped in an energized reactor. At some point an hourly employee responded and was able to release them. This was a very serious safety situation that could have had a fatal outcome,” said Madsen.

He said a full investigation was conducted after the scene was secured, resulting in what Madsen called “a very significant fine.”

Operating as WorkSafeBC, the Workers’ Compensation Board of British Columbia is mandated through the Workers Compensation Act (WCA) to prevent workplace injuries, carry out inspections at the workplace and investigate serious workplace injuries, and in the worst-case scenario, workplace deaths.

Should WorkSafeBC find an employer violated the WCA, the Occupational Health and Safety Regulation or WorkSafeBC orders, it can fine employers for failing to take sufficient precautions to prevent workplace injuries.

The WorkSafeBC penalty summary published on its website confirmed it had investigated an incident at the smelter.

“While conducting maintenance work inside a gas treatment centre reactor, two workers were trapped inside the reactor and sustained exposure injuries. WorkSafeBC determined that work had been done without all locks in place as required by the firm’s confined space key box procedure,” reads the summary.

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The Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety describes a lockout as “the isolation of energy from the system (a machine, equipment, or process) which physically locks the system in a safe mode.”

“The energy-isolating device can be a manually operated disconnect switch, a circuit breaker, a line valve, or a block. In most cases, these devices will have loops or tabs which can be locked to a stationary item in a safe position (de-energized position).”

WorkSafeBC’s penalty summary reports further that BC Works failed to ensure that energy-isolating devices were locked in a safe position using acceptable procedures made available to all workers required to work on the equipment.

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“In addition, no record of a risk assessment for the work task was available, and the key box procedure did not name all the participants who applied locks. This was a high-risk violation.”

Responding to a list of questions sent to BC Works relating to the incident, spokesperson Kevin Dobbin replied via email that Rio Tinto was very disappointed that the incident had occurred.

“Rio Tinto’s number one priority is the safety of our people. A thorough investigation has been conducted and actions taken, including training for employees to prevent this from happening again,” said Dobbin.

He said Rio Tinto is “reviewing options regarding the penalty that has been imposed.”

The previous highest penalty issued by WorkSafeBC was in May this year, on a company in Trail, for $646,302, nearly $16,000 less than BC Works’ penalty.

Teck Metals was fined following an incident at the facility during a WorkSafeBC inspection when a worker was spotted walking through an energized equipment area to operate a control panel.

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