A COAL miner who ran off the road and crashed into a tree while driving home after three days of 12-hour shifts has had his $1.13 million damages payout overturned in court.
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Troy Matinca was close to his home in the Hunter region after leaving the Ulan mine, outside of Mudgee, about 6pm on April 17, 2016, when he was injured in a single-car crash.
A trial judge found last year that his employer, Coalroc Contractors Pty Ltd, had been negligent by failing to take travel precautions that would have prevented the crash, which he found had been caused by fatigue.
Mr Matinca had worked three 12-hour shifts as an underground coal miner in the three days immediately before he ran off the road, and was awarded $1.13 million in damages.
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A panel of three judges in the NSW Court of Appeal has now ordered that judgment be set aside, and ruled in favour of Coalroc Contractors instead.
Several grounds of appeal were found to have been made out, including that the judge had made an error in finding that work fatigue had caused the crash and Mr Matinca's injuries, and in finding that a 20-to-30 minute rest break would have eliminated the risk.
The Court of Appeal also found the judge had erred by failing to find that speed, the driving, and the road conditions were the material cause of the crash and the injuries.
Justice Christine Adamson wrote in her judgment that experts in the trial had agreed "momentary inattention" led to Mr Matinca careening off the road, not a "loss of consciousness", based on the path of the Toyota Prado SUV.
The court heard Mr Matinca had no memory of the crash - or the several hours before it happened - and there were no eyewitnesses.
"While fatigue was one explanation ... there were other possibilities which arise from the circumstances," Justice Adamson wrote.
The ruling means Mr Matinca will not receive the million-dollar payout he was awarded in 2022, and the issue of costs was reserved by the Court of Appeal.
Court documents show he did not wish to participate in the appeal.
Mr Matinca had worked his usual three 12-hour shifts at the mine, about 45 minutes from Mudgee, on April 15, 16, and 17, 2016.
The court heard he usually stayed in Mudgee on Friday and Saturday nights, before travelling home to Mount Hutton on Sunday evening, a trip of 270 kilometres which took him about two hours and 20 minutes.
He would drive the 45 minutes from Mudgee to the mine on Sunday morning, work, then drive home, and would not usually stop unless to fuel up.
The court heard Mr Matinca was familiar with fatigue from his work training. He had only been with Coalroc Contractors since earlier that year but had been a coal miner since 2004.
Mr Matinca was travelling on Macquarie Road about 8.20pm on April 17, about 11km from his Mount Hutton home, when he veered off the road at the end of a sweeping right-hand bend.
He ultimately came to rest 18 metres into the scrub when he hit a tree head-on.
It was dark and the road was wet from rain at the time, the court heard.
Mr Matinca lodged civil proceedings in the NSW Supreme Court in April 2019, claiming damages from Coalroc Contractors, his employer, for loss suffered as a consequence of his injuries.
His case at the trial was that the crash was caused by fatigue "induced by the nature and conditions of his work" and that his employer's duty extended to taking reasonable care to manage the risk of an accident as a result of fatigue on his journey home.
He was awarded $1,130,782.28 in June, last year, before the successful appeal.
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Police and crime reporter at the Newcastle Herald. Email: afalkenmire@austcommunitymedia.com.au
Police and crime reporter at the Newcastle Herald. Email: afalkenmire@austcommunitymedia.com.au
