Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Aug 01/01) - The father of one of the men killed in an accident at Diavik mine earlier this month is flying from his Newfoundland home to the mine in search of answers.

Fred Wheeler said those conducting the investigation of the July 17 accident that killed his 27-year-old son, Greg, and Gerhard Bender, 33, have yet to contact him.

"I've never heard from anybody yet," said Wheeler from his Corner Brook home. "We're so far away, right, and we've never heard anything, so if I go up myself at least I know what happened."

The two men 18 were metres up, attaching cladding to the side of a large building at the Diavik diamond mine, when the manlift they were on toppled over, killing both.

An iron worker like his son, Wheeler said he wants to talk to people at the mine who saw the accident. He and his late son's girlfriend will be leaving Newfoundland next week, likely Wednesday, for the mine.

The Workers' Compensation Board will say nothing about the accident while the investigation continues.

Bender and Greg Wheeler had been at the mine site 300 kilometres northeast of Yellowknife for only five days when they died. They had been hired by Supreme Steel of Edmonton, one of many sub-contractors building the $900-million diamond mine.

The Grove lift the men were operating is supposed to be untippable. It is equipped with sensors that are designed to automatically shut down the machine when there is any danger of tipping.

"It's a tool of the trade," said Supreme Steel president John Leder. "A lot of these sites require 100 per cent fall protection. Then these man lifts come into play."

The Grove lift has a maximum working height of 40.2 metres. Leder said both men were trained on the lift at the site and, he understood, during previous jobs.

"Right now we're waiting for some information from the manufacturer and some other professionals," Leder said.

Leder went up to the site shortly after the accident to interview witnesses. He said it is unlikley the machine tipped because it encountered a soft spot on the gravel pad it was being operated on.

"I think that's been discounted at this point," Leder said. "I walked the site where it happened and I didn't see any soft spots. It was fairly hard."

Chief coroner Percy Kinney said his report on the accident will be done only after the WCB completes its investigation.

Routine toxicology reports requested to determine if alcohol or drugs were a factor should be complete in roughly two weeks, Kinney said.

The RCMP has conducted the witness interviews for the coroner's report.

This is the first time in the almost 30 years Supreme Steel has been in business that a man lift has fallen over, Leder said.

"It's a tragedy, of course," he said. "We want some answers too. We're trying to get to the bottom of it because we don't want this to ever happen again."