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Compliance Guideline for
MSHA's Part 46 Training Regulations


Training and Retraining of Miners Engaged in Shell Dredging or Employed at Sand, Gravel, Surface Stone, Surface Clay, Colloidal Phosphate, or Surface Limestone Mines

Version 3 - Published May 28, 2001.

We developed this guide to provide information to the surface nonmetal mining community about the new Part 46 training regulations. This is the third edition of this Compliance Guide. We have added additional questions and answers based on questions we have received since the release of the first guide.

We (MSHA) also wrote this Compliance Guideline in the more personal style advocated by the President's executive order on "Plain Language." In this guideline "you" refers to the mine operator and independent contractor, and "we" and "us" refer to MSHA.

Part 46 is a performance-oriented rule and many of the requirements allow you to decide how and when your training will be conducted, select the topics appropriate for your mining operations, and choose the instructor(s). With a performance-oriented rule, like Part 46, there is more than one way to meet its requirements, and the way you comply may differ from another mining operation.

Although we believe that Part 46 is clearly written and easy to understand, we developed this compliance guide to answer typical questions about the rule. As we continue to work with mine operators and miners, we will learn from our experience and share this information with you through updates to this guide. We recognize that the safety and health hazards associated with mining are site-specific and mine operators need flexibility to achieve the new regulation's objectives. Part 46 was written with this in mind.

Please contact your local MSHA office if you have any questions about the applicability of Part 46 requirements at your operation.

For a listing of updates made to Version 2, please see this file.


For assistance, call your local Metal & Nonmetal MSHA office or contact MSHA’s Educational Field and Small Mine Services Eastern Region, at the following Link.




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