Work Health and Safety graduate, Chloe Ngarua was literally thrown into the deep end when she was posted to Melbourne’s Metro Tunnel project as part of her Certificate IV training. She worked in the CYP Design and Construction head office and on site, deep in the tunnels, acting as a safety administrator wherever she was needed.

“It was mind blowing. I’m used to being on the other side of those walls, using the public transport system. I never thought I would ever see it actually being built in front of me. It’s not every day you get to work in tunnels, especially within and beneath the Melbourne CBD,” Chloe said.

Chloe completed her traineeship through AGA (with formal training delivered by iTFE, both part of the IntoWork Group) and recently received the Safety Award at the AGA Graduation and Awards Ceremony. Her decision to study workplace safety was largely driven by wanting to help workers come home safely to their families.

“My dad worked on construction sites when I was growing up. He’d often leave for work before we woke up and come home after we’d gone to bed. Thinking about his safety and the safety of everyone on site did play a part in our lives. Being involved in ensuring the safety of workers was definitely a factor in why I decided on doing these studies,” she said.

Chloe worked across all five new underground station sites in what is a predominantly a male-dominated infrastructure project. She credits her dad for instilling the confidence to feel comfortable in a construction environment. She said it takes a lot of patience to have some of the difficult conversations about safety and that women are often better placed to deliver those messages.

“Not everyone is keen on the idea of us stopping work to make sure everybody is safe. They just want to get the job done. I feel like women have the attributes to help workers understand a little more about what we do and why we do it, rather than them thinking we’re there to make their lives more difficult.”

Chloe said she’s grateful for the support she had from AGA and that her consultant was there for her whenever she needed. With a career in workplace safety ahead of her, the 25-year-old is looking forward to her next challenge and winning AGA’s Safety Award has helped confirm she’s chosen the right path.

“I love interacting with people on site every day. Whether it’s a simple conversation or going in-depth about what I do or what the workers are doing. We’re here to make sure everybody comes to work safely and goes home safely. We’re not here to make anybody’s job harder, we’re all here to work together and get the job done.”