We are nothing after our death. Let us donate our body organs for the poor.

Be not afraid of anything. You will do marvelous work The moment you fear, you are nobody - Swamy Vivekananda

If you think safety is expensive, try an accident... - O.P.Kharbanda

Preventable accidents, if they are not prevented due to our negligence, it is nothing short of a murder - Dr. Sarvepalli Radha Krishna, 2nd President of India

Zero accidents through zero unsafe behaviors. Do not be complacent that there are no accidents. There may be near miss accidents (NMAs). With luck/chance, somebody escaped knowingly or unknown to the person. But, we can't be safe, if we depend upon the luck.

Safety culture is how the organization behaves when no one is watching.

We make No compromise with respect to Morality, Ethics, or Safety. If a design or work practice is perceived to be unsafe, we do not proceed until the issue is resolved. - Mission statement by S&B Engineers & Consultants Ltd. http://www.sbec.com/safety/

Human meat gets least priority - A doctor's comment on accidents

CSB video excerpts from Dr.Trevor Kletz, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQn5fL62KL8

Mar 7, 2009

Summer Fires

This year, it appears summer started in January itself. As the weeks progress, already less crowds are seen on the roads in the afternoon.

Wild vegetation on the roadside, around industrial plants, chemical storages, along the railway tracks, etc is a cause of concern as it becomes dry. In the beginning of this month, there was a news item that a rail compartment parked in a scrap yard caught fire and was totally burnt. The fire was attributed to the waste material stored around the area.

The source of fire can be anything, starting from cigarette butt. Even oil soaked cotton rags, when left as such, or wet grass under sun can be subjected to bacterial action and this results in slow heating of the matter and gradually with increase in day time temperature, it can catch fire.

Few (9-10) years back, there were a series of reports about fires in ammunition depots during summer. The reason attributed at that time was that many of the material are covered under tarpaulin cloth and the heat trapped inside caused increase in temperature and finally lead to fire.

Legislations also say to keep all plant / storage surroundings to be free from combustibles so that even if fire starts, it will not affect plant / storage areas. It is better, if atleast 6 m around these areas is maintained free of wild vegetation, trees, etc by paving the areas so that recurring work of grass cutting, etc can be avoided and no one needs to be reminded for these jobs.

Similarly, if HT wires are going above, the area below should be free from wild vegetation, as any spark can start fire below and this happened at many places. It is a common sight to see growth of creepers around HT towers. These also can catch fire during summer as they become dry.

Public also behave irresponsibly by dumping all the waste around the HT towers, transformers, street light poles. Even if municipal waste bins are available, people throw the matter near the bin, instead of dumping into the bin.

Thought there is talk of 'Behaviour Based Safety Processes (BBSP)', I am unable to think of what we can do to educate the persons, as everybody says that they know the hazard, when we explain them, but keep repeating it. We can compare this attitude with wearing of helmet. The reaction of the persons is, 'Yes, we know that we can break our head without helmet, but, oh, that nasty thing, it irritates'.

What type of movement is required to drive the persons to follow safe practices, without loosing our patience. If anybody sees this article, may kindly suggest.

Featured Post

Reduced my weight from 96 to 76 kg and tummy from 38-40 to 34-35 inches in about 9 months

I am working in the safety department of a government organization. As a part of the job, I used to go around and interact with person...