Matt Jones

3.00 AM

My day on site starts by going to the gym in the early morning. It’s normally a lot quieter in the mornings and is always the best way to start the day. The morning view at camp isn’t too bad either.

4.00 AM

By 4 AM the dry mess is open, and I can grab all my food for the day. Rice crispies are the go-to for breaky at camp, and I'll grab a bacon and egg wrap for a later breakfast on site. There’s always a whole lot of options for food throughout the day but today I got some fruit, gnocchi, and butter chicken before heading back to my room for a shower.

4.30 AM

4:30 rolls on and I make my way to the car to meet the other surveyors. We make the quick 5-minute drive to camp and get started with the day. My morning starts by checking emails for potential work or requests and finishing any processing that we didn’t get done from yesterday afternoon. 

6.15 AM

At 6:15 we have the daily underground meeting where all underground workers get briefed on hazards and logistics for the day. There’ll normally be around 150 people in that meeting and it’s a good way to get an understanding of the day. Straight after, we will jump into a tech services meeting where we discuss our plans for the day and sort out any other important jobs. Once that’s all sorted, I start planning out the day underground.

8.00 AM

At 8AM It’s time to head underground with another surveyor. I always have a lot to do underground, with tasks ranging from drone flights, stope scans and incident surveys right through to development drive laser installations and drive pickups. Basically, anything that needs to be positioned underground or shown digitally on the surface will need to be done by our survey team.

My first task is a drone flight of a large open void (stope) underground so that it can be checked against the design for the engineering and planning team. As I send the drone out into the stope its flight becomes fully automated and explores the extents of the stope. The pictures below show the data captured by the drone (in red), an image from the drone’s camera underground, and the drone itself.

Next up I head to an active heading (section of underground which is being mined) to install a laser. The jumbo operators need survey to install lasers, so they know which direction to mine. Ill pick up that heading too so that we can map it when back up on the surface.

Before I head back up to the surface, I survey a few more headings, check the alignment of a Rhino drill rig, scan a rhino hole drilled by that rig, and mark up a few designs sent by engineers and geologists that morning. There’s always a lot happening in the survey department and there is a lot to wrap your head around when you first start.

3.00 PM

At 3, all the essential underground work is complete for the day, and it’s time to wash the car and head into the office to process all my data.

5.00 PM

Knock-off time is 5PM and I head back to camp with the rest of the surveyors. Sometimes we head to the bar, gym, or courts but today I just head back to the mess and grab some beef brisket for dinner.

5.30 PM

By 5:30 pm I’m back in my room. I have a shower, chuck on the TV, and watch a bit of the footy. Sometimes I'll put on a movie or read a book – anything to just chill out after the day.

7.30 PM

At 7:30 pm, I head to bed ready to do it all again tomorrow.

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