A successful trial will see BHP roll out a high-tech new fatigue monitor on over a hundred of its massive trucks at an iron ore site in WA.

Seventeen trucks have been testing out the remarkable ‘Driver State System’ (DSS). It uses eye-tracking cameras and software to record data about optical movements and facial expressions to gauge driver fatigue on the job.

BHP says it is pleased with the potentially life-saving results of the trial, and will now spend around $1.5 million introducing the technology across its 87 truck fleet at Pilbara Mining Area C and the 23 rig fleet at Eastern Ridge.

The contract is a big boost for industrial safety company Seeing Machines, whose CEO Ken Kroger said in a statement this week: “the mining industry is acknowledging and supporting the advances being delivered with the DSS technology, and the integral role that eye tracking technology has to play in keeping their operators safe.”

The technology consists of a number of devices with different tasks to form a whole picture of driver fatigue. Cameras check the driver’s eye movements, facial movements, head positioning and micro-sleeping – if it senses a driver may be nodding off it can trigger “an audio alert and seat vibration, which would wake the dead,” according to a demonstrator at a trade show this year.

The system has had a booming year in the Australian health and safety game; picking up contracts with Caterpillar, WesTrac and Toll as well.