In total, the Queensland Mines Inspectorate reported 183 high potential incidents for the month of February with the growing number of employees entering the industry pushing up the figures.

“Higher numbers of HPIs reflect workforce growth in the mining industry,” a state Department of Mines and Energy spokesperson told ILN.

“More workers means more potential safety issues.”

An operator fell about 2m to the ground when he stood on a rubber wheel flap attached to the engine compartment of an Atlas Copco 6020 underground truck.

The operator was flown to hospital with a suspected fractured hip and coccyx.

In another incident, an aluminium ladder was being used to access the walkway on a mobile crusher with the top rung hooked over the crusher’s ladder hooks.

As the crusher operator climbed the ladder, the top rung broke and the ladder fell against the crusher.

The operator fell about 2m to the ground, breaking his left forearm.

In one mechanical incident, high pressure oil from a burst hose struck a worker on a longwall while he was using a hydraulic tensioner.

He sustained a 10mm laceration to his rib cage and was treated for possible oil injection.

Another mechanical incident involved the catastrophic failure of the blades of a 250 kilowatt ventilation fan, resulting in metal parts being projected through the steel wall of the protection cone into a work area.

In a vehicle collision incident, the top of the cab of a Cat D10 dozer contacted the walkway of a Marion 8050 dragline while the dozer was conducting clean-up operations within the house swing area.