Miners put to the test to see who’s best of the best

A competition like few others took place at Prairieland Park on Saturday.

Workers representing 16 mines in the province competed in the 51st annual Emergency Response Mine Rescue Skills Competition. The competition pits response teams against one another in a series of competitions that include surface problems, confined space emergencies, fires and first aid.

Scores are calculated, and eventually one team is crowned above the rest.

Chris Stansfield is the competition co-ordinator of the event and said each of the volunteer-based crews spend all year preparing for the competition.

“I know one surface team had their team ready probably six, seven months ago,” he said. “They practise probably once, twice a week. (There is) a lot of dedication, effort and training going into everything.”

The event becomes extremely important for all of the companies and teams involved. Co-ordinators use documented real emergencies to help keep training current.

Belinda Mitchell co-ordinates the first aid event and uses the information she gathers each year as a training tool.

“They’re taking home a problem that is possible,” she said. “They may not have thought about it, so we’ll videotape it all. We’ll do up a solution package and send them so teams can start training to it.

“So they’re actually taking home a different kind of a trophy.”

Every detail of the event is meticulously planned. Mitchell spends a year getting her materials together and meets with her team throughout the year, while others spend time to tweak or create new problems for crews to solve.

There’s not a lot to be taken lightly either. Even though these are volunteer teams, bragging rights are on the line for each mine.

Volunteers lead teams around to their events to ensure there is no tampering. Competitors weren’t allowed to speak to 650 CKOM when requested, and they are held in a room called “lock up” between events where no speaking among teams is allowed.

The fans’ favourite event is the firefighting competition. Sean Linton has been hanging around that area for more than 35 years when he followed his dad there every year. Now, he runs the event where there is always room for surprises.

“We’re trying to simulate as best as we can, if they had a fire on site, what that fire would look like and how best to respond to it,” he said. “We always have a way we think it should be solved, we see it solved that way, we see it solved the wrong way, and then we almost always see them solve it a way that we didn’t think of.”

Nutrien-Patience Lake ended up as overall surface winner. Mosaic Esterhazy K1 was the overall underground winner.

No matter who wins each year, Mitchell believes these workers are invaluable.

“In my opinion, these guys aren’t paid because they’re useless, they’re not paid because they’re priceless,” Mitchell said.