(a) Within 2 years from the effective date of this Act, a person or persons trained and certified as emergency medical technicians shall be made available at all mines by the operator thereof as follows:(1) At least one person trained and certified as an emergency medical technician shall be on duty at a mine at any time 30 or more persons are working at the mine. Such person or persons may be assigned to their regular mining duties and shall have available to them at the mine at all times the necessary equipment to be in compliance with applicable federal regulations.(2) Telephone service or equivalent facilities shall be available which will provide 2-way voice communication from the emergency medical technician in the mine to medical personnel outside the mine who provide emergency medical services on a regular basis.(b) Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, a person or persons trained and certified as an emergency medical technician shall be employed in all surface coal mines as follows: (1) If a mine has employees working at different locations within a radius of not more than 15 miles or a lesser number of miles as may be determined by the Department of Natural Resources and said locations are connected by telephone service or equivalent facilities, a person trained and certified as an emergency medical technician or the equivalent at any location on the shift shall be deemed to be compliance with the provisions of this Act.(2) If fewer than 20 persons are employed on a shift, an ambulance service with 1 member certified as an emergency medical technician or the equivalent, not necessarily coal mine employees, located within a radius of 15 miles, or such other distance as may be approved by the Department of Natural Resources upon request for and approval of a variance thereto, shall be deemed to be in compliance with the provisions of this Act. A shift shall include all persons working at the different locations of a mine.
P.A. 89-445, eff. 2/7/1996.