Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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Question 1091: To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the laws which protect public property in the vicinity of commercial explosive blasting at quarries; the distance the danger zone extends from the explosive blast; the distance at which people are safe from these blasts. [1895/07]

Tony Killeen (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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The handling, use and disposal of explosives are covered under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (Extractive Industries) Regulations, 1997, the Mines and Quarries Act, 1965 and its related regulations, and the Explosives Act, 1875.

The Quarries (Explosives) Regulations 1971 as amended (S.I. No. 237 of 1971), which are made under the Mines and Quarries Act 1965, make provision for the storage, care, issue, transport and use of explosives in quarries. They regulate the duties of quarry managers and other persons involved in blasting operations and in firing explosives. They prescribe the type of equipment to be used and the safety measures to be adopted in using this equipment.

The Mines and Quarries Act provides that quarry managers ensure that quarrying operations are so carried on as to avoid danger from falls whether within or outside the quarry; thus the overall effect of compliance with the Act and the Regulations in protecting persons at work in a quarry would also be to ensure the safety of persons and property as a consequence.

The Regulations require quarry managers, for the purpose of securing the safety of all persons when shot-firing is being carried out, to make shot-firing rules allotting to competent persons and specifying the duties to be performed by them on any occasion on which shot-firing is about to be or is being carried out.

Those shot-firing rules must specify a suitable system to ensure by means of the posting of notices or sentries or otherwise that adequate warning is given to all persons within, near or approaching the danger zone that shot-firing is about to commence and must specify a suitable system to ensure that adequate signals are given for the purpose of notifying persons employed at the quarry that shot-firing has, for the time being, ceased.

Under the Regulations, it is the responsibility of the shot-firer to determine the danger zone required to be created and to ensure that the warning required by the relevant shot-firing rules has been given and that no person is in the danger zone without having taken proper shelter. The distance covered by the danger zone will depend on a number of factors, including the specification of the blast and the nature of the material being blasted, and must be determined as part of a hazard identification and risk assessment process. However, according to advice from the Health & Safety Authority, a danger zone should be as large as reasonably possible and should ensure that material from the blast is not projected beyond it.

A person posted as a sentry in pursuance of shot-firing rules may not leave the place to which he or she is posted until signals have been given or until directed to leave that place by the person who posted him or her there.

Quarry managers are required to take such steps as may be necessary to ensure that sufficient and suitable shelters are provided for the use of the persons employed at quarries who are within the danger zone likely to be created when shots are fired.

The Health and Safety Authority advises that, if during the course of an inspection of the blasted area, or at some later date, it is discovered that materials were projected beyond the defined danger zone for a blast and that persons, either employed at the quarry or other persons who may be affected, were placed at risk of injury then the details must be reported to the Authority as a specified "dangerous occurrence". As soon as is reasonably practicable, the explosives supervisor must investigate the cause of such projection of fly rock and ensure that all measures are taken to prevent recurrence at subsequent blasts.

The shotfiring rules referred to are intended to ensure that shotfiring operations at the quarry take place without endangering persons. They should take proper account of local circumstances, for example any risk of accidental initiation. The determination of the danger zone likely to be created by the firing of each shot, evacuation of the danger zone and the provision of effective shelters when a shot is tested or fired are all essential elements of the shotfiring rules. Furthermore, shotfiring and related activities should only be undertaken by competent persons.