An IoT-Based Monitoring System for Worker Safety and Healthcare in Mining Environments

Abstract

This work presents an Internet of Things (IoT) monitoring system based on a star-configured wearable wireless sensor network in mining environments. The system monitors the health of mining workers (blood oxygen concentration, heart rate, and body temperature) and environmental parameters (CO levels, temperature, and humidity) in real time. The data collected are transmitted through Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and Wi-Fi technologies to a server for monitoring and warning purposes. The proposed system, utilizing wearable sensors, has been tested in a mining environment, achieving an average packet latency of 0.4 seconds and a packet delivery rate of 99.6%. The sensors and gateway form a highly flexible star network, allowing for the addition or removal of sensors in approximately 0.3 seconds. Furthermore, with the MCU’s transmit power set to 0 dBm, the communication range between two BLE wearable sensors extends up to 100 meters in free space and 20 meters in mining environments with obstacles.