HARMONY Gold will hold a safety day for its employees this week after the death of a mineworker during a fall-of-ground incident at its deep-level, single-shaft Doornkop mine in Gauteng.
The fatality at Doornkop mine near Soweto on Thursday last week involved a rock drill operator.
A day earlier on Wednesday, another Harmony Gold employee also died while working on underground rail maintenance at the Mponeng mine near Carletonville.
“Harmony Gold Mining Company regrets to announce that one of its employees employed as a rock drill operator tragically lost his life, following a fall-of-ground incident at its Doornkop mine,” the company said in a statement on Friday.
It added that the cause of the accident was now under investigation internally and by the industry regulator.
“Harmony will be holding a company-wide Safety Day next week as a reminder of the critical importance that good safety practices play in safeguarding our future,” it said.
Harmony CEO Peter Steenkamp said he was deeply saddened by the loss of life at one of the company’s mines.
“At Harmony, safety is our foremost priority. A safe mine is a productive one. These tragedies serve as a harsh reminder that we can never be complacent and much more still needs to be done to achieve our goal of zero loss-of life,” he said.
Steenkamp added that Harmony was continuing to focus on “embedding risk management practices” throughout the company as it bids to “eliminate accidents” in the work place.
In January, Harmony recorded another fatality in a heat-related incident at Mponeng.
The company reported in its operational update for the nine months to March 31, 2024 that there had been a slight regression in the group lost time injury frequency rate for the nine-month period to March 2024, at 5.60 per million hours worked, from 5.50 per million hours in the previous contrasting period.
It attributed this to worsening incidences that include slip-and-fall accidents.
“This was a result of an increase in the less severe agencies such as slip-and-fall. Accidents from traditional high-energy agencies such as fall-of-ground and rail-bound equipment continue trending lower.”
BUSINESS REPORT