Historically, when dealing with emergencies in underground coal mines, the focus has been on systems to protect miners working underground, such as refuge bays and self-contained self-rescuers, with less emphasis placed on what happens on the surface.

Project leader David Cliff said the project, funded by the Australian Coal Association Research Program, focuses on managing information during an emergency.

“The aim of the project is to speed up information flow which will speed up response, which makes the reaction to the incident much more effective and reduces the likelihood of injury or fatality," Cliff said.

While the University of Queensland has had previous ACARP-funded projects to develop information systems for emergencies, it ran into difficulties convincing mine operators to implement the changes.

Cliff said the principal reason for this was that previous projects required mines to implement an entirely new system.

“Because it's a special system they don't see the need, because 'it can't happen to them'," he said.

For the latest project, Cliff and his team decided to look at how information is normally collected at the mines, and see how the existing systems can be adapted to function in an emergency.

While the technology used to collect information is important in an emergency, Cliff said it is also vital that the information collected goes to the correct people.

“It's [about] control over and knowing where the information is going and who has the information that is needed,” he said.

“When we do an assessment of an emergency response plan, people have often developed these systems without any thought about what information is required to manage the incident, or who has that information."

Cliff said some of the information that needs to be established quickly in an emergency is:

• Where is everybody underground?
• What happened?
• What is going to happen?
• What resources are available on the surface to deal with the incident?