Re-entry tender process moves to next stage
25 May 2018

A number of suppliers who responded to a recent procurement process to recover the Pike River Mine drift access tunnel will next be selected to submit full proposals to the Pike River Recovery Agency.

The Agency sought expressions of interest on the Government Electronic Tender Site (GETS) for a specialist supplier to both assist with developing a detailed plan to ensure it is feasible to carry out the work, and to undertake the approved manned re-entry and recovery works. The supplier is also likely to be required to undertake mine sealing and rehabilitation works at the completion of the project, Agency Chief Operating Officer Dinghy Pattinson says.

“More than 60 subscribers registered an interest, and from that, we received 14 actual responses by this morning’s close-off. We will now apply a weighted scoring to evaluate those responses. After 6 June we should know which shortlisted parties we will be asking to put together detailed proposals.

“They will need to be able to demonstrate their track record in providing similar services, an ability to source specialist coal mining equipment and appropriately trained and qualified personnel to operate the equipment and have robust health and safety culture and practices. The exact nature of the required work, required equipment, and timeframes will not be known until the re-entry and recovery plan is well advanced. These requirements will be refined alongside the plan,” Mr Pattinson says.

Ends

Background:
Concurrently, the Agency and technical expert advisers are fine-tuning the concept plan developed at the start of May, which will be submitted shortly to the Minister Responsible for Pike River Re-Entry Hon Andrew Little for approval. The suppliers selected from the current procurement process will be involved with the next stage of the project - detailed planning, including identifying all potential risks and ways of dealing with them.
A final re-entry plan and advice around it will then be submitted to the Minister.

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