Last night another Western Australian mining train has derailed. A Mineral Resources Limited train has derailed 30 empty ore wagons south of Norseman. It is believed that the derailment resulted from heavy rain and flash flooding damaging a section of ballast under tracks.
Mineral Resources Limited confirmed this morning that approximately 30 empty iron ore wagons derailed during a journey from Esperance to the Koolyanobbing Operation (Koolyanobbing), which is about 50km north of Southern Cross in Western Australia’s Yilgarn region.
The train was made up of MRL-owned locomotives and rolling stock, was south of Norseman, on the Norseman to Esperance line, when the derailment occurred early on Sunday morning, 11 November.
No one was injured as a result of the derailment.
The train, comprising 106 wagons, was returning from Esperance after safely and successfully delivering 7488 tonnes of iron ore fines to MRL’s Esperance port facility.
MRL is working with Arc Infrastructure, the owner and operator of the railway track, to assess the damage to the track and how long it will take for the track to reopen.
At this stage it appears that heavy rainfall and flash flooding in the region on Saturday washed out some ballast from under a small section of the track. Arc Infrastructure expects repairs to the track to be completed this week.
MRL does not expect this derailment to have a material impact on its Koolyanobbing iron ore production and shipment schedule. There is damage to some of the derailed wagons but not to MRL’s locomotives.
MRL will update the market as and when appropriate.
Mineral Resources Managing Director Chris Ellison said today “Mineral Resources continually reviews its operating procedures to ensure we maintain a safe work place and achieve our safety objectives. Initial investigations into this derailment suggest our safe train operating procedures were followed at all times, and that the derailment was caused by a section of the train track being washed out caused by Saturday’s heavy rainfall and flash flooding.
“We are working with Arc Infrastructure to determine the timeframe for track repairs. As soon as we have confirmation that the track is repaired we will resume haulage of ore.”
Image: Supplied Mineral Resources.
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