Haul Truck Operator

Louise Hattam

Justine McGinley needs plenty of drive in her job. The 29-year-old from Western Australia is a r who trains other operators for the mining industry.  Driving a haul truck is a specialised skill. Operators use haul trucks to transport raw material from one area to another.

McGinley traded her office job with a finance broker to train as a haul-truck operator in 2000. “I got a five-week traineeship at a mine in Kalgoorlie operating 793C haul trucks and I stayed on because the money was so good,” McGinley says. She says operators can earn $75,000 to $100,000 a year.

“I decided I wanted to work in training so I got the qualifications in training and assessing.”  McGinley began as a trainer in 2003. She works at registered training organisation Mining Training Services (MTS). The company provides specialised training in haul-truck operating. As a registered training organiser administrator her role is to improve an organisation’s quality systems and procedures.

“I work in the office, but I go out in the field and train in the classroom and in the pit. I am involved in theoretical and practical aspects of training.” she says. MTS trainees earn nationally recognised training qualifications on successful completion of training. “A lot of large mining companies require people to have certification and in some states it is a legal requirement. There is a huge skills shortage within the mining industry,” she says.

McGinley says men are often surprised when they find out she is the trainer. “I’m only 5ft 2in (157cm) tall. Men don’t expect me to be the trainer,” she says. In a traditionally male-dominated industry, women are becoming more commonplace as heavy-machinery operators and they constitute two out of 10 trainees in the haul-truck operator course. “Many companies prefer women on site because we are usually gentler on machinery.”

Haul-truck operators who gain qualifications with MTS are eligible for employment with recruitment and labour hire companies servicing the mining industry. The organisation trains 500 graduates a year as excavators, front-end loaders and haul-truck operators. Trainees come from around Australia, including many from Melbourne. Trainees complete training on the haul-truck-operator course in five days in a limestone quarry pit at Neerabup, near Perth. Some stay in Western Australia but others return to their home state and gain employment in the mining industry.

Mining Training Services, ph: (08) 9404 6060.