A mining company was sentenced to pay fines and reparations in a Tauranga court yesterday over the death of a worker in July 2016.
Oceana Gold appeared in Tauranga District Court for sentencing in March and a decision was released yesterday.
In the fatal 2016 incident a worker had been driving an earthmoving machine underground when it fell 15 metres off a vertical edge.
A WorkSafe investigation found that Oceana Gold had failed to develop and implement a safe system of work for the creation of 1.5 metre high bunds above vertical slopes.
The company was ordered by the court to pay a final fine of $378,000 and reparations of $350,000. This was on top of voluntary reparations totalling $660,000 that have already been paid.
A statement released today from WorkSafe says that following the incident, Oceana Gold developed an innovative, non-industry-standard procedure for placing steel bollards along open slopes, to stop an incident like this from happening again.
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