“Eman at Yazdchi Law was extremely professional, responsive, and supportive at all times. He and his staff exceeded all of my expectations.”
Andrea Dalessandro
✦ Board-Certified Specialist in Workers’ Compensation Law — State Bar of California ✦
Construction is California’s most dangerous industry. When you’re injured, experience matters.
By Eman Yazdchi, Esq. · Certified Specialist in Workers' Compensation Law
Construction at the Boron borax mine is not like building a strip mall or framing a house. It is industrial construction on a massive scale — pit expansion that moves millions of cubic yards of earth, structural work on processing facilities that handle caustic chemicals, installation and maintenance of conveyor systems stretching across the mine site, and road construction along pit walls where a miscalculation can send equipment and workers into the void below. Construction and earthmoving crews at the Rio Tinto Borax Mine face hazards that rival the most dangerous construction projects anywhere in California. If you have been injured doing construction or earthwork at the Boron mine, you need a lawyer who understands both construction injury law and the unique demands of mining operations.
The Rio Tinto mine undergoes constant construction activity. Expanding the open pit requires massive earthmoving operations — excavation, grading, benching, and haul road construction that never truly stops. Workers operating dozers, scrapers, and excavators along the edges of a pit hundreds of feet deep face fall risks, equipment rollover hazards, and the ever-present danger of unstable ground giving way beneath them.
Blasting is a core part of pit expansion. Drill and blast crews bore holes into the pit walls, load them with explosives, and detonate them to fracture ore-bearing rock for extraction. This work involves handling explosives in extreme heat, working at heights on unstable rock faces, and dealing with misfires — charges that fail to detonate and must be carefully approached and remediated. Blasting concussions, flying rock injuries, and hearing damage from repeated exposure to detonation shock waves are well-documented hazards.
Beyond pit expansion, the mine requires ongoing construction and renovation of processing infrastructure. Building and retrofitting chemical processing equipment means working around caustic substances, in confined spaces, and at heights on industrial structures. Welders, pipefitters, ironworkers, and electricians performing this work face falls, chemical splash burns, electrical injuries, and crush hazards from the heavy structural steel components involved in industrial plant construction.
Conveyor system installation and modification is another constant construction activity at the mine. These systems run for miles, carrying ore from the pit to the processing plant. Installing new conveyor sections requires heavy rigging, steel fabrication, and alignment work that exposes workers to pinch points, dropped loads, and entanglement in moving machinery during testing and commissioning.
California's workers' compensation system covers construction workers injured at the Boron mine regardless of fault. Under Labor Code section 3600, whether you are a direct Rio Tinto employee or a contractor brought in for a specific construction project, you are entitled to benefits if you are injured in the course and scope of your employment.
Benefits include full medical treatment under section 4600, temporary disability payments under section 4650 while you recover, and permanent disability benefits under section 4658 for lasting impairments. Construction injuries at a mining operation frequently involve multiple body parts — a fall from scaffolding during plant construction might damage the back, shoulder, and wrist simultaneously — and the permanent disability rating should reflect injuries to each affected body part.
For construction workers employed by contractors rather than Rio Tinto directly, an important consideration is identifying the correct employer and insurance carrier. Multiple contractors may operate on the mine site simultaneously, and determining which entity carries workers' compensation coverage for your particular work assignment is a threshold issue that an experienced attorney will resolve early in the process.
What makes construction injuries at the Boron mine particularly serious is the overlay of mining hazards on top of ordinary construction risks. A construction worker building a retaining wall at a commercial site faces certain standard hazards. That same worker building a retaining structure along a pit wall at the borax mine faces those same hazards plus exposure to borate dust, the risk of pit wall collapse, proximity to active blasting zones, and temperatures that can exceed 110 degrees in the Mojave summer.
This combination of risks often produces injuries that are more severe and more complex than typical construction claims. An attorney handling these cases must understand the full range of exposures — not just the immediate traumatic injury but also any chemical exposure, dust inhalation, or heat-related condition that occurred as part of the same work environment. Labor Code section 3208.1 allows for claims based on specific incidents, while section 3208.2 addresses cumulative injuries from repeated exposures — and many mine construction workers have both.
Yazdchi Law P.C. handles construction injury cases from the Boron mine at the Bakersfield WCAB, working with medical evaluators who understand the combined effects of construction trauma and mining-specific exposures.
Injured at work in Boron? Call (661) 273-1780
Tap to call →Attorney Eman Yazdchi is Board-Certified in Workers' Compensation by the California State Bar, placing her among fewer than 1% of attorneys in the state with this credential. Construction injury cases at mining operations involve layered complexity — multiple potential employers, overlapping construction and mining hazards, and permanent disability evaluations that must account for injuries across multiple body parts. A Board-Certified specialist brings the depth of knowledge needed to navigate these cases effectively and recover the maximum benefits available under the law.
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