Safety alert 09/2011 - Fatigue management for fly in/fly out commercial vehicle drivers

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file type icon 09-2011 Fatigue management for fly in / fly out commercial vehicle drivers

Commercial vehicle drivers operating on both mine sites and public roads are being scheduled to work mine site rosters which could be in breach of the Western Australian Occupational Safety and Health Regulations 1996.

Contributing factors 

  • Recent WorkSafe investigations have identified that the responsible person at the workplace had failed to ensure that commercial vehicles are operated in accordance with vehicle operating standards governed by Regulation 3.132(2) of the Occupational Safety and Health Regulations of 1996.
  • The roster prevented solo commercial vehicle drivers from having at least two periods of 24 consecutive hours of non work time in any 14 day period, increasing the risk of driver fatigue.  An alternative to this is, that in any 28 day period the driver has at least four periods of 24 consecutive hours of non work time if, and only if, the driver has no more than 144 hours of work time in any 14 day period that is part of the 28 day period. 
  • The responsible person at the workplace failed to ensure that the fatigue management plan allocated to fly in fly out commercial vehicle drivers was effective in managing the risk of driver fatigue. 

Action required 

  • A responsible person at the workplace must ensure that the rostering of commercial vehicle drivers operating commercial vehicles within Western Australia does not exceed these operating standards. This may be achieved by effectively reviewing and checking for compliance against the completed trip records of commercial vehicle drivers which are kept at the workplace. 

Further information 

This Alert contains safety information following inquires made by WorkSafe about an incident or unsafe practice. The information contained in this Alert does not necessarily include the outcome of WorkSafe’s action with respect to an incident. WorkSafe does not warrant the information in this Alert is complete or up to date and does not accept any liability to any person for the information in this report or as to its use.

WorkSafe
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Last updated 20 Apr 2016
First published 12 Mar 2014

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