PS: You made your transition in early 2018. What were some of the easiest aspects of the change? What surprised you along the way?
MM: Moving to my new position as a reliability technician at Teck Pend Oreille Operations, there were several predictive maintenance instruments that were different from the ones I was familiar with. Fortunately, with help from the manufacturers and suppliers including some onsite visits by their experts, I was able to figure out the differences fairly quickly and start putting them to use. Likewise, thanks to all the site tours and help from the various tradespeople on our team, it didn’t take me long to find out where all the surface and underground equipment that I’m responsible for was located.
A big surprise for me was the safety culture at Teck. Everyone made sure I had all the proper training. Teck also has a daily 7:00 a.m. safety meeting which I find very helpful. We bring everyone from maintenance, operations, administration, and management together to discuss the day’s activities, provide safety shares and company updates.
PS: Tell us about your new company—what attracted you to mining?
MM: I decided to switch from the food industry to the mining industry to broaden my horizons and sharpen my predictive technology skills.
Teck is a diversified resource company committed to responsible mining and mineral development. Teck owns or has interest in 12 mines in Canada, the USA, Chile, and Peru which includes Pend Oreille Operations in Washington state where I work. Our operation is totally committed to condition monitoring as we focus on looking for potential failures before they happen. This enhances efficiency as we plan and schedule repairs, which is much more effective and efficient compared to scrambling in run-to-fail mode.
