Trilogy, a world class supplier of voice communications technologies for the industrial and defence sectors has been selected to provide enhancements to an Ampcontrol Intrinsically Safe telephone network for the Australian mining industry.
Australia’s coal mining sector is critically important to the country’s power generation and export sectors and as such this industry continues to explore ways to increase its efficiency, effectiveness and safety. Communications is a key element to all three of these aims, whether it is routine calls or in response to an emergency: fast and dependable contact between the surface and the personnel below surface is essential.
Supplied through Trilogy’s distributor in Australia and New Zealand, Amber Technology, a Mercury system will be used to add powerful new functionality to this tried and tested mining communications solution.
In normal operation the system needs to accommodate telephone calls from above ground to the underground locations and vice versa and from one location underground to any one of the other 30 locations. When an emergency occurs the operator needs to be able to take control and immediately sever all incoming and outgoing external communications preserving system bandwidth to deal in the most effective manner with the emergency as it develops. The ability to sever these lines prevents, for example, non emergency calls jamming the system, blocking essential calls from being made.
The solution provided by Trilogy involves four of its Mercury Interface Units and a dedicated telephony switch controlling the Intrinsically Safe (IS) Telephone System underground. The IS telephone system is a two-part system requiring a safety barrier and a telephone handset that has been designed to maintain the outward appearance and basic operation of a conventional telephone system.
All calls to and from the IS phones, the operator and any outside lines are routed through the Mercury system at all times. Above ground a control room has overall administrative control of the system using a PC based virtual panel and headset. From this position the system can be managed including assigning individual IS phones with direct dial telephone numbers.
At the operator position, which uses a Mercury PCI card and a virtual panel, the system can be configured and managed with the operator able to call any one of the thirty IS phones with a maximum of four at any one time. In an emergency a ‘Break Lines’ key can be used to instantly sever all of the connections running through the telephony switch to external lines whilst still allowing all internal communications to continue unimpeded. This allows optimal efficiency to be achieved with management of the communications prioritised according to the safety need. Once the emergency has finished, the control room operator can re-enable the facility to make and receive external calls.
"We have had great feedback from the client with an order already received to expand the system to include an additional eighteen users" said Mark Ellis, director Trilogy Communications. "this represents a further contract in the mining industry and is part of our efforts with Amber Technology to expand our presence into new markets.”
About Amber Technology
Amber Technology is one of Australia's largest and most respected distributors of high technology equipment solutions to the defence, professional broadcast, film, recording and live production.
Formed in 1987 Amber Technology delivers some of the world's most innovative & smartest electronics to the technically thirsty Australian & New Zealand markets. Our success has been built on a formula of offering only the best & most innovative technology to our clients and backing it up with unmatched after-sales support. For more information please visit www.ambertech.com.au
About Ampcontrol Group
The Ampcontrol Group is a leading international supplier of electrical and electronic products to the power, energy and mining sectors. With strategically positioned operations around the world, our products and services are internationally recognised.
We pride ourselves on providing superior products and services to all our market sectors including Surface & Underground Mining, Power Distribution, Energy, Oil & Gas/Petroleum, Defence, HVAC & Environmental Monitoring, Tunnelling, Industrial, Infrastructure, and Automotive/Camping. For more information please visit www.ampcontrolgroup.com
