Singer spoke at the Chamber of Minerals and Energy of Western Australia 2012 Safety and Health conference in Perth yesterday, saying Queensland personnel eventually played a crucial specialist support role to the Pike River incident management team.

“We knew that people would be hurting,” Singer said.

“We needed to prove beyond unreasonable doubt that it was a safe environment to go underground.

During his talk, Singer discussed the important function the Department of Employment, Economic Development and Innovation’s Safety in Mines Testing and Research Station had in providing specialist gas monitoring, analysis and interpretation and the importance of effective decision-making immediately after a disaster of this scale.

Singer played an important role in the Pike River rescue efforts, offering advice and supervising the New Zealand incident management team following the November 2010 explosion which took the lives of 29 men.

He said a gas monitoring team from Simtars and other key personnel were deployed at the scene within hours of the incident, with emergency helicopters waiting to take the experts to the site.

Singer said being deployed at Pike River so soon after the explosion to provide help and advice was challenging because emotions were running high.

Within a day of the explosion there were bag samples being collected from boreholes which were taken as gas chromatographs to determine whether or not the underground atmosphere was explosive.

Singer said there was no absence of support or external resources.

He admitted the mines rescue team was keen to go underground by the second and third day after the explosion to search for any chance of survival.

“So we had to give a presentation to the team to help them understand the gravity of the situation,” Singer said.

“After we gave the presentations, the mines rescue team thanks us.”

Singer said by day five post-explosion, a second borehole was developed into the workings and a bag sample was to be collected from it.

“There was a lot of anticipation that [the] sample would say there was no ignition source and the team could go underground so mines rescue teams were on standby and the families were all hoping for the best,” Singer said.

“It was a key decision … everyone was waiting on that outcome.”

Singer and his team consulted with the University of Queensland and miners on the field during the analysis of the sample.

“After a couple of hours analysing, there was evidence that there was a methane flame and I had to take the bad news to the team,” he said.

“When the bad news was delivered, the mines rescue team stood down – it was a very sad moment.”

The Queensland Mines Rescue team then had to regroup and focus on how to put out the fire underground.

This was done with the GAG unit, which was effective in starving the fire of oxygen and dousing the flame, while work to seal the mine took place in parallel.

Singer admitted there was no real defining moment when the search and rescue mission following the explosion turned into a recovery effort – it was rather a “clouded and grey” area.

However, he said doubt about the chances of survival began to arise after the second explosion at the mine.

Emergency services were unable to recover the bodies of the miners due to unstable conditions at the mine and Singer admitted the attempt to recover bodies would be an ongoing struggle.

More than a year on from the tragic explosion, Simtars continues to provide assistance to Pike River on a daily basis to ensure the mine atmosphere remains stable and under control.