Lightning stand-down alerts for mine and construction sites

Lightning is one of the few weather hazards that stops work on the spot. When a storm builds over a pit, a crane pad or a blast pattern, supervisors need to know how close the strikes are, whether to stand crews down, and when it is safe to start again. Lumen Sites shows that for every site on one screen.

How it works

Lightning comes from the Vaisala global lightning detection network, delivered through Xweather. Lumen Sites looks for strikes within 100 km of each site.
Each site has a stop distance, 10 km by default, and a warning distance, 30 km by default. Set both to match your trigger action response plan (TARP).
A strike inside the stop distance sets the site to Stop. A strike inside the warning distance sets it to Caution.
The status holds until 30 minutes after the last strike inside the ring, and the dashboard shows the all-clear time.
Sites are checked every 5 minutes while storms are forecast or strikes are nearby, and the dashboard refreshes every minute.
A map shows the site, its stop and warning rings, and the latest strikes.

Distances that match your plan

Lightning can strike well away from the storm that produced it, so sites usually prepare when strikes are within a few tens of kilometres and stop outdoor work when they come closer. The exact distances belong in your own TARP, and Lumen Sites uses whatever you set for each site.

One subscription covers up to 5 sites, so a large operation can watch its pit, plant and camp separately. A strike 12 km from the pit can be 4 km from the plant.

Storm risk ahead of time

Lightning detection tells you what is happening now. Lumen Sites also shows thunderstorm risk for every hour of the next 48 hours from forecast models, so you can plan lifts, pours and blasts around the likely storm window.

What it is not

Lumen Sites is decision support. It does not replace your TARP, any on-site detection equipment or your supervisors’ judgement, and status is shown on the dashboard rather than sent as a message.

See Lumen Sites: A$999 a month for up to 5 sites