2 Yukon mine deaths blamed on faulty brakes

Workplace safety investigators in the Yukon are blaming two recent deaths in the territory's mining industry on faulty equipment brakes and a disregard for safety procedures.

Jim Conklin, 60, and Paul Wentzell, 20, who was originally from Daniel's Harbour on Newfoundland's west coast, died in separate incidents at different mines in the Yukon in September and October, respectively.

In both cases, brake failure on their equipment was the direct cause of the deaths, according to preliminary findings from the Yukon Workers' Compensation Health and Safety Board.

"What we really want people to understand is that failure to maintain equipment or failure to use it properly will result in incidents. And in these two particular incidents, I mean, the results were tragic," Kurt Dieckmann, the compensation board's safety director, told CBC News.

Conklin, who owned a placer gold mine on Dominion Creek near Dawson City, was killed on Sept. 11 when the engine on an old loader he was driving stalled while it was going up a ramp. He lost control as the runaway loader rolled backward down the ramp and flipped.

Investigators determined that Conklin's machine had no serviceable brakes, Dieckmann said.

In the case of Wentzell, who died Oct. 19 at Yukon Zinc Corp.'s Wolverine zinc mine, investigators determined that he had been run over by his own pickup truck after he had put it in neutral and failed to apply the back-up brakes before getting out of the vehicle.

Dieckmann said a further investigation will examine the underlying causes that allowed those incidents to occur.

"We'll look at why conditions are allowed to exist in the workplace, why things do go wrong. That's kind of the deeper things that we look into," he said.

It could take a year for the compensation board to finish a final report on both fatalities, he said.