Top 50 Risk Management Blogs

Listed below is the link on top 50 risk management blogs of which I follow the 7th blog i.e Risk and Safety Blog that gives some ideas of risk assessment and an understanding of the risk.

http://www.mastersinriskmanagement.org/top-50-risk-management-blogs.html#7

Recurrence of accidents - lack of safety culture

We read a number of industrial and road accidents in news papers. It appears that we never learn and never want to learn also. In factories, we do not follow even the well laid out rules of various statutes and established procedures and on the road, we do not respect the others on the road. We are in hurry always and we do not want to start a bit early. Even if the other person on the road is wrong, if we avoid showing our road rage, we can avoid many of the accidents.

In the factory, regular monitoring of operating parameters, keeping an ear for the noises from the machines,motors, agitators, equipment; monitoring process and storage inventories; leaving the aisles free from obstructions, interacting with shop floor employees, self discipline by employees, etc can reduce accidents. But, most of the supervisors and engineers appear to be stuck to the tables. When there is no monitoring, then it leads to bypassing of procedures, wrong reporting and complacency. This also gives a wrong signal to new recruits.

Most of the plant layouts also appear to be congested. We put more and more equipment in the same area  and whatever planned during initial setup with sufficient space will not be seen after future capacity additions. This congestion also leads to unsafe conditions and can endanger the lives of employees in emergency.

If the rot is not attended in the beginning stage, then even the best management expert can't do anything. When we compromise the above safety issues for the fear of unrest, union problems, unrealistic production goals, then so be it and see the deterioration of safety culture and one day, you may close the shop temporarily for a few months or permanently.

Fatality at a Zirconium-Titanium Facility

It is reported that two persons died in a facility that handles zirconium-Titanium. Read the information from the link here. The incident occurred during packing of titanium powder into bricks. Federal Investigators Seek Cause Of Fatal Hancock Co. Blast - News Story - WTOV Steubenville. CSB in a statement stated that it is deploying 4-member investigating team. Internet search shows some accidents/injuries during the handling of pyrophoric materials, in which some useful information can be found in these links. LINK1, LINK2. 

1. Zirconium, titanium, thorium and other metal fires have great potential to cause injuries and fatalities as the thermal radiation can initiate fires in the surrounding areas. They can easily ignite and explode when subjected to friction/impact. It is well known that explosions be devastating in confined spaces. 
2. In combination with insufficient water, the metal fires can grow bigger due to release of hydrogen and can also cause sputtering leading to flying of burning splinters all around (some times to a few hundred meters distance - source: internet search) and cause secondary fires.
3. The zirconium fires are intense and bright and can cause retinal damage when viewed with naked eye. The fire once initiated can reach great heights in no time depending upon the quantity of material involved and size, when turnings are involved. It is reported extensively in literature and NFPA that metal powder/dust can cause dust explosion and friction is sufficient to initiate this.
4. TEC powder in portable extinguishers is effective only for small fires and big fires can be extinguished only by application of large quantities of water from all directions by experienced fire fighters. Further, continuous watch for at least a day is required after extinguishing as it is likely that the material under the heap can keep burning for a long time.
5. As per the safety advice mentioned in MSDS/NFPA, and as it is with any chemical, lesser the inventory, the more safer it is. We can't sit assuming that everything is safe when we are only storing and not handling / processing, which proved very costly during the famous Bhopal accident.
6. Pyrophoric materials need very little energy to catch fire / explode and it is stated that the static charge accumulated on a person is sufficient to initiate fire of this dust/powder. For a safe work place, it is recommended to use antistatic apparel, provide earthing to discharge static charge on the equipment/containers, flameproof/explosion proof electrical fittings, maintain at least 60% humidity, etc in the work area.
7. The powder generated should be incinerated every shift / day (depending upon the quantity) under controlled conditions so that the material can be rendered safe and can be disposed off as landfill.

Training and its effectiveness

Training the employees for skills is a major task for any organization. And imparting skills to do the work safely is much more bigger task. Generally, class room safety training provides only basics, do's and dont's, SOPs, etc along with case studies. But, for the person to work safely, on the job training i.e. shopfloor training can be effective rather than class room training. And the person under on-the-job training requires proper guidance and supervision till he understands the implications and is moulded. This type of training may be costly for the managements as the number of persons trained under one instructor will be limited to a few at any given time. If the number of trainees increases, then the amount of time and attention by the instructor on each of the trainee will be reduced.

Though, nobody is interested in getting involved in accidents, still the occurrence of accidents indicate about the lack of knowledge and may be complacency developed over a period of time. With the on-the-job training and subsequently effective supervision can lead to accident-free workplace.

New EPA tool to assess safety of chemicals

The LINK does not give much information other than reporting the development. However, we can keep checking the EPA website for latest news and its applicability to chemicals in our work place.

Bhopal Accident - One more year passed!

Another year passed to count on Bhopal accident. After the Bhopal accident, we can recount the accidents at HPCL, Vizag and IOCL, Jaipur where human lives are lost in double digit. We do not know, how many are going to happen at any time. We may think that we are doing pretty well on safety matters, but it is the luck and time factor rather than our safety alertness that accidents of great magnitude did not happen.

All of us know what to do to avert an accident, but complacency and wrong priorities make us to delay immediate actions for improving safety at workplace.

In the West, well established industrial organizations saw occurrence of accidents, though there safety record is at its best till the occurrence of the accident.

Though, incentives do not lead to permanent safety solutions, still we can offer significant incentives to employees who point out hazards and those responsible for allowing those hazards should be punished parallelly.

Too much freedom and associated inaction should not be tolerated in any hazard installation and wrong doers should be handled severely.

The Safety Officer's Perspective - Fire Engineering

Please go through the following link.

Number of safety officers in a hazardous plant - statutory and practical requirements

Safety officers in any hazardous installation are appointed as specified in statutes, which say that factories where 1000 or more persons are employed, safety officer should be appointed. When the employee strength exceeds 2000, for every additional 1000 employees, one safety officer should be employed with 500 or more employees rounded to 1000. For major hazard installations, factory inspector can specify the number of safety officers irrespective of employee strength. Accordingly, the number of safety officers for various employee strength will be as follows:

Employee Strength        No. of safety officers

Upto 1499                             1
1500-2499                            2
2500-3499                            3
3500-4499                            4
5499-6499                            6
8499-9499                            9 and so on.

In some states, rules are framed as one safety officer for every 3000 employees is to be engaged.
As per Maharashtra Safety Officers Rules, 1982; the no. of safety officers required is,
1000-2000    1
2001-5000    2
5001-10000  3
>10000         4

But, in reality safety professionals find it difficult to manage safety aspects with so many employees in a factory, particularly where the operations are varied and complex, and with a large number of departments. The duties of safety officers include carrying out / conducting,

• inspections if not every day but atleast once in a week
• issue of safe work permits
• permission for modifications, changes, erection/commissioning of new equipment/process, etc
• job hazard analysis
• safety meetings in every department
• apex safety committee meetings
• safety audits
• accident/incident investigation
• training
• safety awareness programmes
• safety seminars
• followup with departments for compliance with recommendations of various committees
• safety studies like HAZOP, ETA, FTA, HIRA, etc
• coordination with regulatory agencies
• preparation and filing reports as per statutory requirement
• updating and maintaining records
• PPE procurement
• office safety (of various departments)
• contractor safety
• and so on

In some factories, safety officer will be asked to manage fire safety and environment mangement also which will increase administrative work load.

The work load increases depending upon the number of departments / sections, safety officer has to deal with. For example, if the number of employees in a factory having 4-5 departments is 4000, the work load for 4 safety officers appointed as per statutory requirement will be somewhat less compared to the work when the number of department is, say 30-40 as the complexity will increase both in technical and administration. The problem multiplies for the safety officers when his colleague in the safety department proceeds on leave as they have to look after safety aspects temporarily during the leave period.

Technical difficulties are in the form of wide variety of operations and administration difficulties are in the form of dealing with a number of shop floor/section/department heads. As the number of employees and departments increase, the levels of officers will increase and accordingly safety officers have to deal from lower to top level in orderly fashion and this increases work load enormously. Shop floor person can say he is doing as per his next level supervisor instructions and if safety officer directly talks to top and next level person, he can say he is not aware or instruct the safety officer to talk to lower level in-charges.

Added to the above, is contractor workers and their safety. Normally, contractor workers are engaged for doing various petty jobs and sometimes for regular plant operations and civil works. The real difficulty is that they will be working at different places on same day or at different periods and therefore job hazard analysis for their jobs and ensuring their safety is a tough task.

Though there are safety coordinators in some factories who do production and safety coordination with the safety department, in practice these safety coordinators give importance to production activities and thus safety at workplace rests with the safety department.

Though, Factories Act and its Rules say the duty of safety officer is to advice and assist, in reality, safety officer ends up in doing the jobs and in some factories, he will be asked to eliminate the hazards also by engaging few contractor workers, i.e., he has to identify and eliminate. After sometime, this may lead to not doing the jobs even as per Factories Rules and cause a dangerous work place for employees.

In view of the above, I feel that the legislations regarding number of safety officers should be reviewed and revised taking into account of number of employees and number of departments as below:

• One safety officer for every 500 employees upto 2000 employees or every 5 departments and thereafter
• one safety officer for every 250 employees

With the above, the no. of safety officers can be as follows

Upto 500         1       2501-2750       7        4001-4250        13
501-1000        2       2751-3000       8        4251-4500        14
1001-1500      3       3001-3250       9        4501-4750        15
1501-2000      4       3251-3500      10       4751-5000        16 and so on.
2001-2250      5       3501-3750      11
2251-2500      6       3751-4000      12

The employee strength should be taken as maximum number (including contractor workers, casual workers, etc) supposed to work at any given time. To ensure safety, atleast one safety officer should be available in shifts other than general shift, including Sundays and holidays.

With the above, I feel that safety department can function effectively to ensure a safe work place.


 

Superman in India

DO NOT TRY THIS ANY TIME, ANY WHERE.

Superman in India

LINK

Responsibilities and limitations of regulators

Recently, I read in local news papers about the fire in a chemical plant. It is stated that during distillation of a chemical to supply to a factory, water entry caused explosion causing serious injuries to four workers. A visiting representative expressed his anger on the concerned Inspector of Factories for allowing the factory to run without permission. The licence for the factory expired a few years ago. Regional Pollution Control Board (PCB) also suspended the operations after a fire incident a year before. The anger of the representative is justified. That the plant was closed by PCB after a fire incident, two years after expiry of licence indicates that the plant was in operation all along.

But, on the other side, what are the resources available to the factory inspectors. What are the powers available to the inspectors. When an inspector identifies a plant with dangerous conditions or without valid licence, he will stop the operations. But, how to ensure physical stopping of operations. The factory inspector can't become watchman for the factory to ensure this. If that is the case, then for every factory or a few factories, one inspector is required. At this rate, the factory department needs hundreds of factory inspectors which is not at all possible because of lack of funds. This is a system failure.

If a factory is run inspite of stopping orders, then the occupier is liable along with the authorities responsible for continuing to supply services likes electricity, water, etc. Similarly, municipality, revenue, police, excise, customs departments which collect taxes and other service charges are also responsible. They can't work independent of other agencies. Once these agencies are intimated about a factory closure, all concerned have to keep check on the said factory. In addition, the customers (factories buying products) of the guilt factory should also be held responsible for making purchases without checking validity of licences. Now a days, with ISO certification, every management needs to ensure proper licences and authorizations before purchasing any items. Of course, if the product is a finished item for purchase by public, then these public can't be held responsible as there is no way of checking the credentials before buying.

There is no information in the news papers about how many times the factory inspector inspected the plant in the last few years. If there were inspections, factory inspector is equally responsible for the incident.

When a proper coordination exists between all concerned agencies as listed above and others, I am sure the hands of factory department will be strengthened to ensure safe work place.

Dangers of confined spaces - Oxygen levels below 19.5%

I read an excellent article on wrong notions of safe oxygen level of 19.5%. One should find why oxygen levels are below 21% and only after getting satisfactory answer, should venture into confined space with proper PPE. I feel that, once oxygen levels are below 21%, one should go inside only with airline respirator / self contained breathing apparatus as suitable it is. We should remember that catridge/canister type respirators are useful only upto 2% of contaminant concentrations and above this, one should use fresh air supply system.

LexisNexis Top 25 Blogs for Workers' Compensation and Workplace Issues - 2010 Honorees

LexisNexis Top 25 Blogs for Workers' Compensation and Workplace Issues - 2010 Honorees

LINK

Process safety and stuxnet worm?

Of late a number of articles are appearing on impact of stuxnet worm on process safety and it is an eye opener for me. Though, I am bothered about safety of my computer at home and office, it never occurred to me that this can lead to accidents in plants which are operated from computers. Possibly, this is due to the fact that only limited sections are operated from computers in the facilities which I saw all along.
Now that I am aware of this stuxnet worm and its cousins that can affect process safety, I though what we can do to prevent such process safety hazards and following are some that came to my mind.
1. As the worm has to enter through internet / removable disks, these computers should not be connected to internet.
2. There should not be any provision to use pen drives, floppy drives, CDs.
3. Realtime protection from viruses, worms, etc should be available. For this realtime protection program loading, the server system should be under lock and key control of a senior officer. If it is affected, then this man only is the channel for viruses/worms to enter the system.
4. A realtime standby system operating on a different mode should be available (diversity in redundancy).
5. Backup should be taken in every shift.
6. The persons manning the control room should change their dress totally in the change room and enter with company provided dress before entering control room / server room.
7. Control room, server room, etc should be under surveillance.
8. As it is seen in the movie Die Hard (2?) of taking over all control systems by connecting from distance, the cables connecting servers with plant data monitoring and control cables should be secured and any attempt to interfere should be sensed and alarmed.
9. Like railway gangmen check the rail tracks regularly, cable system should be checked physically also by authorized staff.

Above are some thoughts which came to me for ensuring process safety from worms like stuxnet. I have to understand about how plants are operated from computers and what are their defence systems.

Empowering safety department - How long?

Recently, I read an article that the new boss of BP is reshuffling the safety division and is making it as the most powerful voice and that they can intervene in any of the technical functions of the BP. This is what is required by law also. Only that we do not follow.
I do not doubt about the capabilities of earlier safety staff of BP. I doubt only about the production staff. It is normal to see in any production facility that production staff and their bosses pay little attention to what safety department says. As the safety department is part of the facility, it can only advise. Implementation depends on the whims and fancies of the production department. Safety department becomes powerful only when the top man gives unconditional support to it. In the present case also, though the new boss ALLOWED safety division to be powerful, the time upto which it can be allowed to function this way will be limited, as Mr Trevor Kletz said, "corporate memory is short". As the memory fades gradually, well meant safety advises become additional work and time consuming for the production staff and slowly they start ignoring the safety advises. By that time, the BP boss who is making safety division powerful may also leave the organization and the STORY WILL REPEAT. Again as observed by Mr Kletz in his books.
It is my observation which evolved with my interaction with many of my friends in various industries and also from my knowledge of reading various books, safety blogs and investigation reports of CSB, HSE, etc that it is a worldwide phenomenon of giving importance to safety only after an accident and then slowly forgetting about it.
A KNEE JERK REACTION INDEED.

Process Safety Management - for whom?

Everybody says process safety management (PSM) without knowing or having commitment. Many may be thinking it as day-to-day plant operation. In this regard, to identify, evaluate and control hazards in chemical plants, OSHA has given guidelines and can be read here.
It must be understood that by doing PSM, we are doing favour to ourselves and not to others. Even, production cost can be brought down, if we do PSM sincerely and follow it. If we do not care to spillages/leakages of chemicals, air, steam; do not care to study in detail before going for a new process / chemical / modification; do not make checklists for operations, then it means that enough attention is not paid for plant operations and it adds to cost of production by way of wastage, inefficient operation, accidents, and so on.
We should not feel like Alice in the wonder land when the unidentified hazards manifest into incidents/ accidents. One may feel stressed to follow the safety principles all the while. But, the stress will be more and can also lead to penalties and punishments when there is loss of life/damage to environment/property.
Many times when we land into simple accidents outside factory, we vow not to repeat such mistakes. But, when we commit such mistakes in a factory, the consequences will be very high and at that time we can move the time back to correct our mistakes. There is no time machine yet available to correct ourselves otherthan following safety principles in toto.

Leniency to violators by authorities

Every day, we see reports of many accidents, incidents, violations by factories. There will be hue and cry for lenient attitude / laxity on the part of the regulating authorities. There will be injuries/fatalities/release of fumes, gases from plant to public domain/dumping of chemicals in the night in public areas/failure of containment from tankers, etc. Immediately, regulators are found fault for not keeping eye on violators. Regulators also visit the affected areas, factories and say that there is no licence for operation or matter is under investigation or notices are slapped, etc. The issue will be left. Media also will leave it as the importance is lost after the item is aired in all channels.
This is not happening in our country alone. When we see reports appearing in several websites of different countries, we come to know that this is worldwide phenomenon. Even, in countries where regulators are tough nuts, stiff penalties are imposed, still accidents/incidents/violations continue to occur and reasons seem to be silly. Though, many do not agree now-a-days that 'safety is nothing but common sense', still that common sense alone can prevent many accidents.
We are all greed and want to save few bucks by following short cuts. Finally, after sometime, everybody would have experienced a huge loss because of one accident and the loss far exceeds all savings accrued so far from short cut methods. Still, the lessons are confined to the affected individual alone and again the same individual will bypass safety after sometime, because our memory is short.
In such a situation, what a regulator can do is the big question, when we do not have self discipline. Then, we have to face the consequences and suffer.

Safety of cockroach killing sprays

Last week, my wife was in the kitchen and suddenly she shouted for help. I ran to her only to see that she is in a state of shock. Later, I was told that the gas burner was lit for cooking. After seeing few cockroaches nearby, she sprayed the killing chemical from the container around the cockroaches. Immediately, the spray caught fire from the gas burner and the flame came towards her. She turned off the burner knob and went into shock. I never thought that spray will be within flammable limits and this taught me a lesson.

Earlier, few years ago, when I sprayed the same chemical for killing cockroaches, over the electrical switch board and also inside the electrical winding section of kitchen mixie and then switched ON the electrical point, the MCB tripped in the house. Without understanding the reason, I set it ON and again switched ON in the kitchen. This time MCBs tripped at home as well as at the LDB in the ground floor of our apartment complex, from where power cables are drawn to my residence. Then, I set it ON. Next, when I switched ON the mixie, there was burning smell from it. Then only it occurred to me that the spray caushed short circuit and lead to tripping of MCBs and coil burning.

Wrist band tool to identify persons in danger and help in Safe Evacuation

A demo found in youtube on above subject is available here.
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdTIYvKhhoc

Stress and accidents

Reason for many of the accidents appears very simple and silly at times.  Many of the accidents did not occur because of some complex reactions or failure of safety systems. But, why do people get involved in such silly accidents. I think, lack of peace of mind is the reason. When we are not at peace, we cannot concentrate on our activity. Lack of peace can be due to

• arguments with relations / servants / milkman / paper boy/ gas station employ
• children education
• well being of blood relations
• arguments with colleagues
• business loss
• greed
• simple problems like vehicle breakdown, plumbing problem at home, ...
• financial needs
• thinking about meeting, examination, bank loan, ...
• etc

We keep thinking about these problems and something happens suddenly causing some injury / emergency. I saw a video, in which it is said, SAFETY IS NO ACCIDENT, NO ACCIDENT DOES NOT MEAN IT IS SAFE.
Accident means an event that unplanned, unexpected, unintentional,...
Though, nobody intends to get in to accident, lack of hazard identification, failure to take preventive measures and not reviewing the safety processes are the reasons for accidents. However simple the hazard appears, we should not be casual. It should be attended immediately. There is no use of repenting after the accident.
Similarly, one should not be relaxed when there are no accidents. May be they are not reported. May be there are many unreported nearmisses. May be the attitude of the manager is not to see minor accidents as accidents.
It is common for top management to boast of good safety record and take credit for it. But, a trulyaccident-free workplace is a reality because of sustained efforts all employees over a period of time. It will not happen overnight or in a week or in a month or in a year.
Some people attach value to human life and workout how much money can be spent on safety programme. My life may be worth $ 1.0 million to you. But, my family does not see like that. For them, it is invaluable. Nobody can remove the tears in the eyes of family members, when somebody dies. Nobody got right to decide the value of human life.
I read in the internet that some organizations care for their employees by attending to their personal problems, employ professionals to teach yoga, meditation and allocate time within working hours so that their employees can have healthy and peaceful life.
What for we earn money, if we do not have stress-free life. Though, some people say, certain stress is required for the growth of the individual, I think this is purely business oriented. The increase in suicide rate everywhere in the world shows that so called acceptable stress is NOT acceptable to the individual. As there is no other means to earn income, persons accept the additional demands and stress themselves. Ultimately, weak hearted will take their lives.  Persons responsible for causing stress should think twice by entering into others shoes and then decide about the work.

Same rains, but areas are flooded

Of late, there are heavy rains in different parts of our state. Though the rains appear to be same like in earlier years, what is disturbing is the fact that more and more areas in cities are getting flooded. Knee deep water on the roads is seen in TV visuals. Even people are washed off due to flash floods on the roads in the cities. Adding to this misery, open manholes / potholes on the road are endangering the lives of commuters on the road. Few have fallen into open manholes, washed off and died.
This is not seen in earlier years. Only in the last 3-4 years, such incidents are happening. Encroachment of stormwater drains (natural and artificial), laying of roads without leaving open soil for seepage of water, not cleaning the drains before rainy season, etc are some of the reasons for floods on the roads.
Huge apartment complexes are coming in the cities thereby restricting the free flow of rain water. Drainage canals/channels are occupied with hutments leaving little space for the water to flow. When roads are relaid, I read few years ago, that the surface of the existing road should be removed and new road should be laid so that the water on the road can easily seep in to the ground. Though I do not know the principle, may be relaying over and over on the same road may reduce the porosity of the road and thus water will not seep.
Further, of late, instead of bitumen roads, concrete roads are being laid for long life, with good intention. However, concrete roads are not allowing the water to sink into the soil. And concrete roads laid edge to edge in the streets without allowance for rain water to flow in the edges on the soil. Business establishments, residential buildings are also constructed with concrete surface upto the roads. Gardens are not maintained in the housing complexes. Parks are disappearing and thus no open areas are left. Trees are cut and the area is used for constructing some more rooms to get income. All this is leading to total concrete carpeting of cities and towns with narrowed storm water drains.
I feel the above are reasons for flooding of roads even with normal rains. The capacity of the underground stormwater drains got reduced because of choking / use of stormwater drain for normal sewage drain. With ever increasing population, these drains are becoming insufficient. When it rains, persons staying near the roads are removing manhole covers thinking that flood water will go into the drains through open manholes. But due to insufficient capacity, drains are full and water stays on the road. Commuters on the road, not knowing about open drains, are falling into these drains and precious lives are lost.

What can be done?

• Floor space index (FSI) should be brought down
• The capacity of drainage system should be in line with the population and industries
• A parameter like open garden area with open (earth) area should be made conditional for all buildings while giving permission
• Either side of the roads should be left open without laying bitumen/concrete
• Summer months should be declared as months of dechoking of drains
• All establishments which do not have parking space and making their customers to park in the roads should be asked to create parking space or to shift to some other location where they can have their own parking so that roads are not encroached
• It is common to see at the entrance of many apartment complexes mentioning that VISITORS VEHICLES ARE NOT ALLOWED INSIDE. Such practice should not be allowed. All residential buildings also should have sufficient parking space within their complex for visitors. Otherwise, they can have multilevel parking instead of grumbling that they do not have sufficient space.
• Though it is not possible in already developed areas, sufficient water catchment areas / lakes should be part of city plan where expansion is taking place so that water can be held instead of allowing to flow like flood and this will also help to meet water needs of the city. Every city should be a LAKE CITY so that floods can be restricted and water need are met.

I feel above are some of the measures to reduce floods in the cities due to rains.

Safety Poem - I Could Have Saved A Life That Day

There are very few poems / songs available with safety theme. Here you can find one. An emotional one that reminds safety professionals not to be scared / afraid / hesitant to caution and advise when we see some unsafe act or unsafe condition.

Noise - Hearing protection programme

There is an article on ill effects of noise and about hearing protection measures. But, today I learnt that though all of us know to reduce the noise levels to below 85 dBA, it is also not advisable to reduce it below to 70 dBA as it can cause hearing problems to operators regarding instructions, warning alarms, etc.

There is also a calculator in the above link to calculate the effectiveness of hearing protection based on the results of noise survey in your shopfloor.

Though Factories Act says 90 dBA is the noise limit for 8 hour exposure, it is a good practice to subject all employees to audiometry test, if they are exposed to 85 dBA even once in a year. Though supervisors will be reluctant to send the employees to audiometry tests to avoid production loss, considering the ill effects of noise induced hearing loss (NIHL) and in extreme case may lead to loss of life if the employee is unable to hear warning alarms.

How to make safety training effective?

Today, I read to articles on makeing safety training effective. One is on presentation skills by the trainer to grab the attention of participants (Safety Daily Advisor). The other is use of safety videos. The original link is published separately in this blog.

Attention: It says that attention of the participants is short and therefore the trainer has to be careful in planning his presentations by giving introduction, a video, narration, quiz for evaluation, etc with interaction in between. This is like a typical James Bond movie which I am attracted to because of an action stunt in the beginning, titles with music, then movie.

Videos: Videos are quite effective in understanding any subject. There is a proverb that a picture speaks 100 words. We remember scenes of a movie for a long rather than the dialogues in it unless otherwise it is a punch dialogue. In the article I read, the author mentions that it is difficult to gather employees at one place to train them. Further, what I feel that general training to meet different trades of employees present in a training session will not be effective and we can't be specific to a particular trade of employees when other trades are present. To overcome this, the author rightly said that making availability of safety videos on-demand will be quite effective. If the videos are made available through intranet with monitors provided at workers' change rooms/cabins (rest places) where they take rest for sometime after lunch / tea break, those interested can see the videos of their interest. This viewing can also be done where there is no work and workers got a free time.

I got benfited a lot and my understanding of chemical safety improved when I watched CSB videos. For more details, whenever required, I went through the investigation reports of CSB. In my training sessions for fresh batches, I start with a brief introduction, followed by some principles and then show a video. There is a huge demand from participants for more videos. I give them the website addresses instead of videos as I feel that if we provide videos as such, then the CD/DVD will be lying in the cupboard without using it ever. If they themselves go to the website and watch / download videos, then, I am sure they will go through in length and make them to surf the net for more and more such videos and information.

Recently, in a training session for experienced employees, when I showed a video on impact of a gas cylinder when it valve is broken, many employees, some them on the verge of superannuation told me that for first time they understood why gas cylinder valves should be protected and why gas cylinders should be chained. Even in feedback forms, they mentioned the same. Mind you, I went for the training session to fill a gap of 15 minutes as the lunch was not ready.

New Safety Training Videos Help Protect ‘Human Capital’ and Shield Employers from $1 Billion per Week in Workers Comp Costs

New Safety Training Videos Help Protect ‘Human Capital’ and Shield Employers from $1 Billion per Week in Workers Comp Costs

LINK

A study on PPE use (not using) by workers - reasons - recommendations

There is good article on why workers do not use PPE and risk themselves to accidents. The article also elaborates on view of the safety professionals about reasons and recommendations for making the workers to use PPE.

Use of robots in automated processes - What are the safety implications?

Automation of processes is preferred by most of the organizations as it reduces human interface and improves productivity. In manufacturing / engineering industry, auto sector, etc most of the material handling jobs are automated and robots are engaged for complex jobs. This reduces lifting of weights of human beings, avoids stress / strain caused due to repetitive jobs and thus reduces health care costs.

However, it is important to understand the programming that went into sequencing of operations to be done in automated jobs and its implications particularly when the jobs are partly automated, partly manual. The job may look simple when routine sequence of operations are carried out. However, if any interruptions / change of sequence is there or breakdown occurs or power failure takes place, we need to know its impact on operations. May be we did not thought of restricting the functioning of robots or like it happens in computers when power failure occurs, there may be hanging of the computer programme. Whether such a situation creates any hazard to shopfloor operators in the vicinity is to be assessed.

Or, what are the hazards when maintenance is to be done when these automated systems are in energized condition. Whether safe positioning is incorporated when emergency stop switch is operated is to be known. Else, when someone looks into the problem during a breakdown, any of his repair job may cause the robot arm to move and hit the maintenance engineer.

Before programming the logics, a detailed WHAT IF analysis is to be done by involving concerned including design engineer, operation engineer, instrument engineer, maintenance engineer, safety engineer, etc to assess all possible hazards for all regular operations / breakdown jobs / maintenance, etc.

Still, there may be surprises depending upon the extent of questioning, imagination, thinking is put during hazard evaluation.

Why accidents continue to occur?

We read regularly in news papers that accidents continue to occur though here and there the concerned are charge sheeted. Most of the time, the families of the victims are compensated by the managements and the issue is resolved to the satisfaction of both parties. Many times, accidents are reported. It is likely that there are many accidents which are not reported and settled without notice. Though this may satisfy the aggrieved, it will not stop recurrence of accidents, if not in the same organization, as no lessons are drawn. The only lesson drawn is that it is economical to pay rather than ensure safety at workplace. This is a common sense. Why one will spend more when there are ways to reduce costs.

There will be reports for sometime in newspapers and then everybody will forget. This is true everywhere in the world. In some countries, as experts say, regulators are task masters and award huge penalties. However, the fact that accidents continue to occur in these countries shows that there is something wrong in implementation of accident prevention programme.

When there is some financial scam, more are affected and there are many stake holders in voicing there concern and try to punish the responsible. However, this is not visible in case of industrial accidents. I do not know, in how many cases, regulators stopped operations permanently after an accident. There may be suspension of operations for a while, but not as a whole. Managements can absorb losses due to suspension of operations for a while. Some can even clevery carryout maintenance works during this period which may be due after sometime and thus save time from annual shutdown.

A serious message is to be sent to managements with severe actions that can make them to realize about the importance of safety given by governments and that they may lose even their personal wealth if any accident occurs.

Otherwise, it is better for the regulators to stop issuing press notes about poor conditions in factores and be contended with the existing conditions.

Workplace accidents - where we are?

I read three articles 1) Why Safety Training is a Good Investment, 2)  Safety Training Pays Off Every Minute and 3) Training Adult Learners on importance of safety training for accident reduction. According to these, in US every year there are 4.0 million non-fatal injuries, 1.0 million man-days lost, every day 15 workers die because of workplace injuries / illness. Training the persons makes them to realize, recognize, evaluate and take effective measures for control of workplace accidents and avoid its ill effects / consequences. As pointed out in the 3rd article, to succeed careerwise, people will be learning relevant new issues. However, we have to make them realize that they have to learn safety aspects also. Otherwise, there will be bloodbath at the workplace as no attention is paid for ensuring the workplace safety. Any decision for increase production without safety means somebody will be hurt in the field. The decision maker may not realize that his decision is the reason for the deaths / injuries. Like, some people say 'to give human touch', decision makers have to give 'safety touch' and assess all consequnces arising out of their consequences.

Now-a-days, in western countries, when buying or placing order on a company, organizations conduct audit including quality, environment and safety audit. Similarly, while recruiting executives, these organizations should verify the safety credentials in the previous employment. For first timers, they can assess knowledge on safety systems, applicable legislations, etc or after recruitment, they can impart safety training. It is not sufficient only to see capabilities / past experience in achieving / reaching production targets alone. Assessment is to be done for SAFE PRODUCTION. Otherwise, accidents like at Bhopal, Deep Water Horizon, etc can happen and lead to closure of the unit or selling of the assets to meet obligations.

CHOICE IS YOURS. WHICH WAY YOU WANT TO SEE YOUR ORGANIZATION.

What is the level of safety followed in advanced countries and others?

It is common to read / hear about the accidents all over the world. However, what is surprising me is that the number of accidents, type of accidents, deaths / injuries due to accidents are occuring in advanced countries as well as in developing countries.

Though governments of developing countries claim about poverty, illiteracy, lack of resources to implement safety, need for development as the reasons for inability to control accidents, I am unable to find the reasons for the accidents in advanced countries. In these countries, as I understand, greater transparency exists, unions are strong and are powerful that question the managements about poor conditions w.r.t safety, huge amounts are spent for ensuring safe conditions, providing PPE, doing audits, etc. Prosecutions are also carried out on erring companies and punishments/penalties are imposted. Still many accidents take place in advanced countries like those in the other world. Most of the accidents appear to be preventable. I am not really getting any reason for this phenomena.

Whether this indicates that the attitude to safety is same whether the country is advanced or not. The motive is to gain short term benefies i.e profits. Accidents are taken as part of the job and the victims are compensated. Only the amount of compensation varies from country to country. Paying compensation appears to be a better business model compared to spending money on accident prevention.

Safety nets - test before use!!!

It is a good practice to have safety nets for works at height to prevent injuries during fall of persons. Small time contractors usually avoid provision of safety nets and even if they were forced, they will provide nets only below the place of work and shift the net as the work proceeds. Because of the cost, the quality of these safety nets also is questionable. In case of doubt, it is better to test the capacity of the nets by dropping sand bags of sufficient weight from height and see whether the net is intact or strands are broken or the net sags. This will also give confidence to the workers and will be an eye opener for the contractor if the net fails. Normally, safety nets should withstand 2200 kgf. They should be provided such that the fall of person is restricted to 2 m and the width of the nets is atleast 6 m from the place of work. There should not be any gap between the wall and the net. Any construction material / debris that falls should be removed immediately to avoid injuries to persons falling on to the net. At many construction sites, I saw construction debris accumulated on the nets with nobody to remove them.

If the floor is good, then one can provide mobile nets which I saw at a construction site. A scaffold structure is made with the net tied all around. This will be located below the place of work at height and is moved as per requirement.

A few construction engineers question about the need for providing the safety net or its practicality to provide. At many places, I saw even for a small work, scaffold is erected (11 storyes height at one software company building, 5 storey height at one super speciality hospital). Therefore, what is required is commitment to ensure safety. Else, we get 1000s of excuses for not providing the scaffold / safety net.

A simple incident during the construction

Recently, I heard an accident from my friend who experienced during the floor tile work in his apartment. Tiles were purchased and brought to the apartment. The marble tiles (about 10' x 6') were kept in an inclined position in the corridor outside the apartment. The corridor is about 4' width. Next day, when he went to construction site, one of the worker commented that the tiles are having vertical straightline cracks and appear to be joined with white cement.
To check the condition, the person in-charge for laying the tiles was called. Both my friend and the worker pulled one tile to vertical position and checked for cracks. To the dismay of my friend, there were such vertical lines as if joined by white cement. Then, 2nd tile also was brought to vertical position and then the third. While checking the third, by holding the tiles in vertical position with my friend on one side and the worker on the other side, slowly the tiles started moving towards the worker's side as the center of gravity (C.G) shifted. This could not be seen initially, but shortly both understood something is wrong and tried to push the tiles to the wall without success. The tiles were now heavy and beyond the capacity of the both persons. Both shouted for help.
Immediately, workers in the ground floor rushed and with great difficulty, the tiles could be put back into position. By that time, the worker had chest congestion because of the weight of marble tiles on him. Immediately, he was rushed to the hospital and the person was alright in a day.
The above accident is unimaginable for ordinary folks like us. The fact that the experienced construction worker also did not caution before examination shows that we have to learn a lot.

Later, on enquiry, the supplier informed my friend that they are not cracks but lines which come during polishing and that he will not spoil his reputation by supplying damaged tiles. He offered to replace the tiles of much superior quality and premium brand, even if one single tile shows cracks.

Similar to the above incident, I remember, few years ago, when my child (about two years old at that time) climbed over the refrigerator racks to take some fruits, the refrigerator started falling towards the floor.
Fortunately, I was next to the refrigerator and immediately could hold and stop the fall of the unit. Otherwise, my child could have got injured under the falling refrigerator.
Same is the case, when we go up the portable ladders and try to access by over reaching. Then also, ladder can fall on the side because of shifting of C.G.

Disposal of gas cylinders ?

Recently there was leakage of chlorine from a cylinder in the Mumbai Port Trust yard and few were affected. Subsequently, I read that all these unclaimed chlorine cylinders lying in the yard for more than 10 years were disposed by dumping them in the sea, under the supervision of a responsible officer of Disaster Control Authority.

This is not a good practice to dispose the cylinders. By dumping the cylinders in the sea, we will be causing harm to the fishes under the water.

It is difficult to dispose a cylinder, if we do not know the contents. However, it is not a new issue to dispose chlorine cylinders. The chloro alkali industry which is well established in the country could have been approached. Every such manufacturing facility is equipped with neutralization / transfer methods. Every two years, the cylinders are tested by the manufacturers at their facilities by emptying the cylinders, cleaning, checking for corrosion, hydro test, etc.

It is unfortunate that a crude method is followed to dispose these chlorine cylinders and in the process creating a hazard for the marine environment.

This disposal is no different from adding effluents to water bodies by some erring industries.

Why safety principles are followed in an organization?

1. Genuine concern
2. Humanitarian feelings
3. Regulations
4. Strict enforcement by authorities
5. Powerful unions
6. Past experience with accidents
7. ISO/OHSAS system implementation
8. Client's requirement
9. Stage show
10. Dedicated team of safety professionals and listening management

Safety management OR managed safety

It is usual for us to hear and read about the commitment expressed by CEOs, CMDs, ... at various functions. They say, SAFETY FIRST, QUALITY SECOND AND PRODUCTION NEXT. After the function is over, these same people will be enquiring about the production statistics for that day without bothering to enquire about safety status. Managers will be fired, if they report drop in production or come with their problems. Such managers may be threatened to find another job or transferred to less important posts and will be given earful in the presence of others, sometimes in front of juniors also. The CEO / CMD wants to prove that he is the boss. If this is the situation, what the managers have to do. They will pressurize their subordinates without much thought about safety. Because, bypassing safety systems will show immediate results i.e increase in output, though in the long run it can result in more accidents and may even lead to breakdown. But, people do not think such breakdowns are because of failure to follow safety. They think it as an event which they attend to rectify and go on. If any accident occurs, then it may not be reported, not investigated and will be covered as a minor accident. Thus the management actually will be practicing the principle of PRODUCTION FIRST, QUALITY NEXT, SAFETY LAST.
If someone is concerned about the accident, if this someone is a union person or safety officer, then the accident will be investigated and some measures may be implemented. Otherwise, it is lost with no record.

Generally, only those accidents where injured have to be taken to hospital for surgery or saving life, will be reported. All other accidents will be recorded as minor accidents. In such organizations, naturally, safety record will be the BEST and the CEO can boast to the world that he leads by example, that he spends so much money on safety systems, training, etc, etc. And one morning, there will be the news of a major accident, shuts down all operations and investigation begins into its activities by the regulator.

Though the regulators scream about lack of safety procedures and systems, nobody is bothered, even the public. Because, they have stake in the company in the form of investment, jobs, contracts, auxiliary business, etc.

We are living like fools where we do not want to see the facts and when something happens, we are happy to discuss threadbare till the topic is HOT or interesting till something new happens. Even media also does the same.

How to improve safety culture - an example

Be a Roman in Rome, is a proverb i.e we should behave the way others do. Similarly, the attitude of the employees for safety reflects its culture, the thinking and will power of the top management and efforts put into it. If accidents are viewed as part of the work and that the injured can be compensated, then the accidents will continue to occur, because it is cheaper to pay for an accident rather than investing in safety systems. It appears costly to change the designs, incorporate safety features, provide training, provide PPE, etc. This is the reason why in many sites, accidents recur. However, if there is strict enforcement of regulations of the land, then there will be a sea change in the attutude of the management towards safety. Now, they think it is cheaper and rewarding to invest in safety rather than pay penalty and worse, go to jail.

Such a change is possible. Suppose, we go to a new place where the language spoken is different. Then, we try to learn or atleast try to find ways to communicate. The need forces us to find ways to communicate and get what we want. Necessity / need forces a person to chage.

Similarly, if regulations are enforced, then factory mangements though feel like fish out of water for sometime, soon they will understand and follow the safety principles prescribed under rules and regulations.  Can we term this as cultural change. I think this is a cultural change. And it happens because someone somewhere is monitoring with a whip in his hand, ready to punish the erring managements.

About Bhopal accident

There was an article on Bhopal accident comparing it with that of BP oil spill. The article can be read at this LINK. The author noted about the poor response of our industry leaders to the injustice met by the victims in comparison with the active involvement of industries at USA against BP. There are many persons in responsible positions in various companies who can come under the Sec 300 of IPC and may not be knowing that they are committing such blunders.
It is essential that top management of all industries should be informed about their responsibilities under various statutes when permissions / licences are issued by concerned government authorities. e-mail is the best service available which can be utilized by regulatory agencies to send e-mails from time to time to these leaders of the organizations.
What I feel is that most of the management representatives do not know about minimum safety procedures to be ensured in their organizations under various statutes and punishment / penalties for violators. Once this is known, definitely violations will come down as nobody likes to trouble himself of attending criminal proceedings against him.

Safety education - at what level it can be started?

I attended a one-day seminar on occupational hazards. The chief guest for the programme was Secretary for the Labour Ministry of the state government. In his address, he talked about various safety issues and finally he came to the subject of safety education. He advised the organizers of the event to coordinate with his senior staff and also of education department to introduce safety subject from school level onwards. He promised to talk to the secretaries of other departments for work in this direction. A noble promise indeed.

I never studied about safety, accident prevention, etc in my entire period of education. When I joined in the job, safety was touched upon during the training but there was no separte paper. Now for last few years, I am seeing that my children are having a chapter on road safety and environment protection. My juniors in the organization are having separte papers in their training programme on industrial safety and environment protection and I am taking classes for them on industrial safety. Really, a good development in our organization. Without studying safety subject, people are not aware of importance of safety and its benefits to the organizations.
In internet, we do have access to lot of information on safety, can see thousands of videos on selected topics. I feel that these videos as appropriate should be shown to children from high school level onwards and are discussed by teachers. At college level, videos on accidents (particularly those of CSB, WORKSAFEBC, HSE, etc) are to be shown and students should be asked to comeout with their own ideas and suggestions for preventing such accidents including design changes. US Chemical Safety Board (CSB) is doing a great service to the world and they even send DVDs of videos free of cost whichever part of the world you are.

The pass mark for safety subject should be atleast same as that for other papers and it should be compulsory subject and not an optional subject.

If a person does not study about safety during his education years, then he will not understand the importance of safety in his employment years and he will be moulded by his workplace seniors in such a way that safety will not a priority to say the least. He may even think that safety procedures are an obstruction to his career growth, to his bonuses, etc till he lands in an accident or accident case depending upon his level of employment. I found this type of attitude when I discussed with my fellow safety professionals from various industries and the story is same. Not many care for safety or advise of safety professionals.

Therefore introduction of safety subject from school level is VERY IMPORTANT and should be continued upto degree level and specializations can be introduced at post graduation level.

Who is responsible for accidents or incidents in an organization?

When some accident or incident occurs, immediately some committee will be constituted to fix the accoutability and normally a worker or immediate supervisor or officer at junior level will be held responsible. But what about the managers or occupier of the company.
People are in limelight and showered accolades for achieving best production. At that time none of the shopfloor level employees will be recognized for the production levels.
Only when some failure or breakdown takesplace, then shopfloor persons will be questioned and punished. From this, we can see that punishments are for shopfloor employees and rewards and recognition are for managers. During delibration of investigation committees, the committee chairman will also be biased because somewhere else he is a manager or senior executive and will be of the opinion that he need not know what is happening at shopfloor and thus is not responsible.
But, Yes. He is responsible for achieving peak production levels. Or, for reducing the costs by process modifications.
But, No for accidents or reducing costs by stopping safety systems or bringing down the level of functioning of safety gear. Such is the appraisal system. Factories Act 1948 clearly holds the occupier of the company responsible for all activites though it exempts him provided he proves sufficiently that accident took place inspite of taking all efforts.

Chlorine leak from cylinder at Mumbai Port Trust

It is reported in TV and websites of newspapers that on 14.07.2010 at about 0315 hrs, chlorine liquid leaked from one of the 105 cylinders seized by customs in 1994 years ago and kept at Mumbai Port Trust (BPT) scrap yard. Out of 141 cylinders, five were full and others were empty. Chlorine leaked from one of these 5 cylinders. More than 100 persons (126) were admitted in various hospitals and more than 500 persons in the area were evacuated. Services of Fire brigade, National Disaster Response Team and other agencies are utilized to bring the situation under control. Subsequently the chlorine in 5 cylinders was neutralized which could have been done long before.

Disposal of gas cylinders is a major issue and is to be as per Gas Cylinder Rules. The scrolling news in a TV channel mentioned that BPT asked Controller of Explosives to dispose the seized cylinders and as there is no response, cylinders were left as such. Controller of Explosives is not the agency for disposal of cylinders. They are regulators to issue licences for storage and handling. It is not known why the cylinders were seized by customs. However, BPT should have asked the person (consignee) responsible for bringing the cylinders to dispose or BPT should have disposed and collected the charges. Disposal means what we can do?. Either give the cylinders to users of chlorine or neutralize the gas in controlled manner.

Apart from the above incident of leaving gas cylinders in scrap yard, few months back we read that radioactive sources belonging to Delhi University were found in the scrap yard of scrap collector. In a book, I read that when someone was cutting a big pipe, a cylinder was found inside the pipe. There must be several gas cylinders lying for several years in scrap yards and storage areas of several industries where we do not know the contents. They have to kept atleast in shaded areas till such time the history of the cylinders can be established. Else, they may leak after sometime because of exposure sun and rains. If someone is doing hot work near such cylinders not knowing about their presence, cylinders may explode and result in fatalities or injuries. Guidelines were issued by CSB for hot work and a video is available in the website (www.csb.gov) about hazards of hot work. Several videos of CSB are also available on Youtube.

What one can do to such incidents is to dispose the cylinders as soon as they arrive by use or neutraliztion or incineration as the case may be. If not possible, they should be stored properly and history cards maintained. For those cylinders already lying in the backyards for several years, we have to shift them to safe storage areas and efforts are to be put to trace the history. If contents and supplier name are readable from the cylinder, then we can dispose them in a suitable manner. 

No accidents implies everything safe or something is wrong?

No accidents – Whether everything is in control or something is not identified?


It is reported that the BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig explosion (11 deaths, 115 survivors) caused by escape of gas and oil from the well dug was preceded by seven years of work without any injury. The drilling was done and the well is to be closed. Another rig will takeover for production from the well. While BP managers assembled to congratulate the team for working without any injury, the pressurized gas gushed from the 5 km deep well and exploded.

The incident is not without early warning signs. The rubber gasket (seal to close the drill pipe tightly and shut the well) of the blowout preventer (BOP) located near the seabed, for the well got ruptured in an incident and rubber pieces were found in the mud used for holding the gas and oil within the well. A crewman accidentally forced the drill pipe by 15 ft through the BOP. But, engineers failed to analyse the cause for the presence of these rubber pieces. This shows that every major accident is preceded by a number of near misses and minor accidents. We should be able to identify, report and analyze all near misses and minor incidents however negligible they are. It appears there is pressure on the crew to complete the drilling work fast as they are already behind the schedule. This might have caused the crew to do away with the repair of critical safety systems too.

Further, the backup control system called ‘pod’ for BOP lost some of its functions. This reminds us of Murphy’s law.

The emergency drill carried out every Sunday to escape after head count was not followed after the accident. People started leaving in the available lifeboats without looking for others on the rig. This shows that whatever drills we do will go haywire and those in possession of escape vehicles will disappear instead of carrying the persons for which vehicles are intended.

It appears that safety is ignored because of the short term profits seen by the management compared to possible losses that may accrue to the organization when run without safety systems in place. The management that is responsible for allowing safety violations may not be there as they may take bonuses and leave. Once a system is violated and is in place for sometime, this wrong practice itself becomes an established system and will be considered normal. This has happened in Bhopal accident. All safety systems for MIC tanks were removed to save running costs. As there were no incidents, the management thought that they have done a wonderful job and reduced operating costs. May be, they are under pressure to show profits so that investors will be happy. Accidents do take place because public memory is short. They may be losers only for a short term and reaping increased valuation of their shares. Those affected because of the accident are limited in number and their voice is lost in the herd (of investors).

Normally when people are happy having achieved certain safety record, it will be followed with a major accident. There is no accident because we are lucky till the accident occurs. We are overconfident of our performance. We ignore the warning signals saying that everything is under control. We venture out to do something adventurous. Those who protest about violations are treated as ‘nuts’ and ‘pessimistic’. They may questioned about their integrity, commitment and chided for accepting bonuses or rise in salaries when systems are wrong as pointed out by the same persons. These persons will be blamed in all respected for pointing the violations forcing them to leave or they will be fired.

When accident occurs, people will conveniently forget everything though cautioned by few and term it as ‘one of those rare accidents which no one expected’.

Safety mantra - If you can't do it safely, don't do it

I liked an article that was published in British Safety Council magazine (http://www.britsafe.org/). In it the Chief Executive of First Group Plc states their approach to accident prevention as below:

If you can'g do it safely, don't do it.

To improve the safety record, their new approach is "First to Zero" to eliminate all unsafe conditions. The target is not at accident numbers but to focus on persons representing these safety numbers. They do not want anyone to get injured and thus aim for eliminating all unsafe conditions. Really, we have to salute the managers and staff for aiming to such a high standards and working towards it.

Safety training - for what?

Many times it is said that to avoid accidents, create awareness, training should be imparted to workers, supervisors and managers. Even employees also will ask for training programmes, seminars, etc. But, what is the actual interest from people. In many training programmes and seminars, we find participants enquiring about refreshments, lunch, bag, pen, etc for the programme rather than the technical programme. Once I heard that a programme will be termed successful, if three conditions are satisfied. They are,
1. Kit
2. Transport
3. Food

The next condition is some sight seeing tour. Even, in seminars we see participants constantly moving in and out with actual serious discussions limited to very few persons. In training programmes conducted within the plant premises also, participants get phone calls to attend some work at shopfloor. Why people will be nominated, if they can't spare the person for the programme. Only for records?

For some, nomination to training programme is like a holiday with pay. They will come at the beginning of the programme and then disappear to do their personal works in the town or see friends.

A training programme will be effective only when participants are subjected to some form of test at the end of the programme and are penalized, if they do not secure atleast minimum marks. Participants should be asked to discuss on a given topic and should be evaluated for their active participation and contribution. If they are involved in any accident or incident after the programme, then he should be asked what is wrong with him or the training he received earlier. May be such evaluation will help the organization to make the training programmes effective and worthy.

Stress on Safety Professionals?

Many safety professionals face the problem of getting attention from their colleagues and management. People are not receptive to suggestions. Suggestions are treated as fancy ideas which are not workable. Or, not economically feasible. Safety professionals are blamed that they do not have project experience. As soon as a safety officer visits a workspot, people think that he has come to stop a work. Complain that they are tensed by seeing him, or make sarcastic comments, or disappear from the place to avoid him, etc. In meetings also instead of listening to safety man, they keep talking with others and when safety presentation is over, all feel relieved that a ritual is completed and is recorded. To show that they are committed to safety, people pay lip service by saying 'safety first, production next'.

Leaving apart production people, what about the stress in safety man. He finds many hazards, unsafe acts, wrong practices, etc. When he tells plant people, he will get no response or he will be entertained with arguments. Being a safety professional and is responsible, he can't keep quiet. He has to engage plant people in convincing them about elimination of hazards identified. Over a period of time, continuation of such practices by plant people can stress safety person and he may become cynic. It can also affect his health and family life as he carries work place thoughts and tensions to home. Everything at home also appears in disarray and he will enter into discussions first, arguments later and finally he may end up a big loser.

Experts say that safety professionals should not get disheartened for poor response from production people, but I don't think this is possible for ever for any person. Even those preaching professionals would have lost temper at various occasions.

Sometime back when I attended a 3-day training programme, one faculty arranged a discussion (actually a drama / skit) among the partcipants dividing them into production and safety groups. I happened to be in production group and few production people happened to be in safety group. During the skit, When I questioned the group playing as safety department, as they used to question me in my plant visits, they were searching for words as were taken aback by my ferociousness as a production man. I think they understood during the skit what I want to convey to them that they actually make such mindless arguments on the shopfloor with the safety man.
I also enjoyed the skit in repeating the questions whatever they said earlier to me. What I want to convey is that by stepping into others shoes, we can understand the problem and intentions. We can ask production man what he will do if he is in safety department and sees such unsafe condtions. Then, he too may think some alternative. This may ease the stress on both production and safety persons. However, this is possible if there are people who are technically sound and are patient to listen. We can't talk to bullying personalities and is futile in conversing with them. Only written communication with copies to their superiors will have some impact in removing hazards at work place.

Static charge ?

Yesterday, I was using washing machine. It is a semi automatic type, i.e it contains two separate drums one for washing and another for spinning (drying). After washing, when I started taking out the clothes, I felt slight pain at the edges of my hand fingers. Earlier also I experienced the same, but I assumed it as pain from nails. I think this tingling pain is because of static charge generated during rotation of the washing drum. This charge may be dissipated if I do not touch the machine for few minutes after stopping it.


LINK

Mechanical barrier for avoiding dust explosions

Please read information on mechanical barrier to avoid dust explosions.

EPA To Seek Employee Participation In Chemical Safety Inspections

As per Environment Protection Agency of USA guidelines, employees and their representatives can participate in chemical safety inspections of the plants to have greater transparency. Read the news item in the link below.

EPA To Seek Employee Participation In Chemical Safety Inspections

LINK

Management of Change (MOC) ?

When plants run for sometime, engineers will find that something is not working as required or they may feel that something else can give better results or some problems will necessiate to modify flowsheet, etc. When shopfloor engineers and supervisors go for implementation of the proposed change, they think that they are doing the right thing to improve. However, the possibility of unexpected events because of the change are normally not studied or anticipated.
Further they think that involving safety department is a waste of time or their work will be delayed because of possible discussions. Therefore they carryout changes without following the established safety procedures. Sometimes, there works give the desired results and therefore makes them to think that they are in right direction ALWAYS. This will set in wrong notions, disregard for safety procedures and will set a bad example for the others to follow the same methods.
Ultimately, a day will come when something goes wrong and blame game starts. Safety department says they are not aware of the change and plant executives say that safety department is not doing its job of surveillance and monitoring. If people do unsafe jobs and then wait for others to point out, then nobody can help. Safety departments are for providing advise and also monitor to caution the mangements. However, if people do works by hiding the information, they are doing so at their own peril.
So, change management should first be applied to persons' attitudes and understanding of safety procedures and then established MOC in the system will be followed by these people with complete understanding and regard for system.

Sparks fall on solvents causing burns to two persons

A newspaper report stated that in a pharma company, sparks fell from a capacitor when two electricians were on the job. The sparks fell on the nearby solvents and chemicals, leading to fire and burn injuries on face and arms of the two electricians.
Safety norms say that ignition sources should not be present atleast 15 m around the flammable storages. Though this is applicable for hot works, the same logic can be extended for storage of flammables also. It is likely that sparks can fly along the wind and can cause fire. The solvent storage area also should be provided with dyke so that leakage / spillage will not spread and are contained.
If it is not possible to remove the flammables away from ignition sources, atleast they should be covered with asbestos cloth or similar fire resistant cover; sand and other suitable fire extiniguishers should be provided near these flammable storages; fire department of the plant should be informed about the srorage and maintenance jobs proposed to be takenup; carryout hazard analysis; communicate the workers about hazards and safety measures to be taken; etc

An animated video describing the hazards during hot works in flammable areas is available at US Chemical Safety Board website (http://www.csb.gov/) and the video link is given here.

Whether safety procedures cause stress at workplace

Sometimes I hear shopfloor people grumbling at safety supervisors that by seeing them, B.P. increases in shopfloor workers. Others say that they are afraid that safety manager will come to them to enquire on some issue. Shopfloor supervisors advise safety persons not to approach their workers directly to avoid undue stress. All such talk or apprehensions appear to be unwarranted unless people do not follow safety procedures or the safety man talks in a dominating manner.
Some safety professionals too think that they get truth, if they pose like a  tough guy. But, with my own experience, I can say that this is not true. Whatever the shopfloor person is willing to tell will escape from the scene next time as soon as he sees the tough talking safety guy. The smooth talking safety supervisors also should be careful that they are not taken for granted. They have to develop friendly networks in all departments so that before entering the shopfloor to enquire about unsafe conditions or investigate accidents / incidents, full information is obtained through these friendly networks.
When someone gives information on phone, safety person should not insist to know the name of the person so that he will feel secured and will have peace of mind. If he is willing, then safety person can declare his sources and also recommend for some appreciation and reward.
Stress will be felt by safety guys also when all shopfloor people surround him questioning his failure to identify and communicate hazards. This, I think should be handled by being visible in the shopfloor through frequent inspections,giving pep talks as often as it warrants and making the people to know about their responsibilities under law. Then, safety department persons will be viewed as their friends and get their help to solve safety issues at the shopfloor.
Workers will be stressed for other reasons also as it was mentioned in a news paper article today that spouse causes more stress than the boss. Again, males cause more stress to their spouse than the female. Other reasons for stress can be ill health, unfulfilled ambitions,  family issues, etc

Contractor safety, expensive accidents, accident prevention

I went through following articles at http://www.safetyxchange.org/ which I felt good to read. The website is very good and one can get e-mails by subscribing (free).

Most Expensive Accidents in History
How to Prevent Contractor Accidents, Part 1  Part2
The General Contractor Duty to Protect a Subcontractors Workers
To Prevent Accidents, We Must Change Attitudes

Have a nice reading.

Safety violations are found, then why the plants are allowed to run?

In an article at http://www.safetyxchange.org/, I read that there were more than 700 violations of safety, operation and environment found by OSHA, EPA and other regulating agencies. It was questioned about the compulsions or need for allowing the unit to operate though so many violations were found before the spillage itself. Many times, regulators identify violations and give time to rectify or pay penalty later for continued violations. Only a few times, unit operations were suspended or stopped. This creates a lenient attitude by managements that outweigh profits over the loss of production suffered because of suspension of unit operations to carryout works for rectifying the violations. After some accident / incident occurs, we repent for not doing the right thing before the event. This like applying the balm after burning rather than avoiding the burns itself.

If plant operations are stopped after allowing some time to correct, then everybody will fall in line and though it looks difficult to achieve safety discipline and people are scared of immediate losses, long term benefits will outweigh these losses and every one will follow the directions of regulators. Or they will not give chance for regulators to find safety violations and a system of identification and rectification will be established by the organizations themselves.

Road rage – what are the reasons?

Now-a-days, TV channels are reporting road accidents every hour and a full page in news papers is about road accidents. Some of the reasons are,


High speed
Overtaking without caring for the vehicles coming in opposite direction
Drivers under the influence of alcohol
Entry of another vehicle from side lane
Parked vehicles on the road without warning / cautioning
Persons / children on the roads
Animals on the road
Lack of proper rest for drivers
Mobile use while driving the vehicles
Not concentrating on the road
Talking with others in the vehicle
Urge to display their driving skills to friends (girls and boys)
Driving before fully learning
Skidding due to sand / soil / oil / water, etc on the roads
Overcrowding leaving little room for the driver to control
Poor condition of the vehicles, etc

Whether oxygen levels at 19.5% are safe for work in confined space?

Many people consider that the oxygen levels at or above 19.5% are safe to work in a confined space. However, I read somewhere that before assuming oxygen level of 19.5% is safe, one should find out why the levels are below that in atmosphere. If the balance 1.5% is of some toxic chemical, it might be fatal also. CO is fatal at 5000 ppm (0.5%). Similarly ammonia. However, if the chemical present has some odour, we can immediately detect and come out.

Otherwise, measuring oxygen levels alone is not sufficient and we have to analyse for presence of other chemicals and purge the confined space with fresh air till oxygen levels are near 21%, say 20.8-20.9%. And fresh air supply should not be stopped during the work. Each and every time when work is stopped for rest or tea break or lunch or end of the day, before resuming the work the levels are to be checked at the place of the work.

I came to know of an accident in which three workers were involved in cleaning the oily floor at a basement were overcome by the toxic vapours present when they resumed work after a tea break. First two persons one after another entered inside the basement and became unconscious. The third one too was overcome but before that he shouted for help and other coworkers present at 0.0 m level immediately rescued them and were alright after a day's treatment.

The unfortunate observation during the rescue opertions was workers lack of knowledge about the switch of fresh air supply blower for the basement. Even the shopfloor supervisor does not know about its location. Awareness about location of emergency systems is the most important aspect and a sketch showing the same should be displayed at important locations in the shopfloor and mock drills should be conducted before start of work in a confined space, every time.

Poisonous fumes from incinerator near Indore - six lost vision?

Y’day a scrolling news item in TV channels and news reports today mentioned about six labourers losing part of their vision because of toxic fumes from an incineration plant in Pithampur, while cleaning solid waste. It is stated that all labourers suffered symptoms of insecticide poisoning (organo phosphorous) like blurred vision, vomiting. Before taking up any chemical handling work, engineers and supervisors should refer to Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) of the chemicals to be handled. It will give information on nature of hazards, handling methods, personal protective equipment (PPE) to be used, etc. It is mentioned that workers did not use any PPE, though the company that engaged the persons is a reputed one.


If the companies do not follow safe procedures and do not ensure supervision, public will lose faith in the industry and whatever they do later will be of no use.

Further, such accidents will show that more inspectors are required to inspect more frequently the premises of the organizations, audit their systems and the findings have to be put in public domain. It may be remembered that though the auditors from head quarters of UCC reported serious nature of hazards in the Bhopal unit, as the report was not known to many, the inaction could not be questioned in time and only after the worst chemical disaster, all concerned started questioning.

Therefore, it should be made mandatory about making availability of audit findings (by regulators as well as certifying agencies) also public like the provisions of Factories Act 1948 under Chapter IV-A and should attract penal provisions like those for violations of Sec 41-B,C,H

Increase of fuel prices - what is its impact on safety?

From y'day, the increased prices of fuels came into effect. Many are opposing the increase. I thought, okay, it will make a hole in my pocket, but what is its impact in my field, i.e., safety and environment. I think that the increased prices may reduce consumption of fuel to some extent thus contribute to the reduction in environment damage. When something is available cheap, it will loose its value / importance.

Many people use vehicles, particularly 4-wheelers for joy rides. Two advertisements which I am seeing in TV channels for last few months depict the same. In one advertisement, a child is sad because he did not get good marks or so, so his father takes him on a ride and the child asks for one more ride. In another advertisement, I think a couple or would-be couple will be on a ride to come out of their moodiness. Actually, it appears many persons don't have any work and therefore wander aimlessly in bikes, cars, etc. Subsidising fuel for such people is a crime. Similarly, supplying subisidised fuel for cars and sports cars whose mileage is very less is also waste of public money which could have been sent on providing education to poor children. In fact, subsidies are becoming a headache for the governments in the long run and they are finding it difficult to come out of this expenditure.

My suggestion is to eliminate fuel subsidies totally. Government should subsidise only public transport to such an extent that people of all categories should feel it economical to travel in public transport than using their own transport. All students can be allowed to travel without paying during their college hours. A pass should be issued to each student and should be punched for one trip to college per day so that wandering by students for timepass can be avoided.

Like issuing licence for driving, governments can issue permits for private transport at a price. This will reduce traffic congestion, reduce pollution, leading to better environment and good health of people. Then, to take care of emergency requirements, government should strengthen ambulance services for medical care and run public transport throughout 24x7 so that people will not be at disadvantage.

Similarly, government should increase excise duty / sales tax on vehicles equivalent to the cost of the vehicle or more. Today, I read in the newspaper that in Nepal, 300% tax is levied on imported cars and thus the cost of Nano car at Nepal works out to INR 4.5 lac. We should tax at these hight rates for all vehicles that are made within the country also.

The decrease in vehicles on the road will also reduce road accidents also and will save many elders and dependents caused by deaths.

The money spent on fuel subsidies can be better used for providing education and public health care which are becoming costly. Though the oil companies claim huge losses on account of subsidies, I am unable to understand why their shares value somuch. The share value of any loss making company will not even quote at its face value but all oil shares trade at multiples of their face value. I have to understand why it is so. After freeing the fuel prices from control, by how much their shares will go up will tell the extent of losses suffered due to subsidies.

Nothing lasts forever. It is obvious that if not now, in another 25-50 years fossil fuels will not be available. As the reserves comedown, oil producing countries will increase their prices and atleast next generation has to pay higher prices because no government can subsidise forever. Instead of using recklessly the valuable resources, let us use them judiciously and increasing the prices is a forceful method for conserving the fuel resources.

Accident liability of independent directors

An article published in Deccan Chronicle today (24.06.2010 Thursday) states that CII asked government to insert a clause in the Companies Bill 2009 to exclude independent directors from any criminal liability for offences commited by the company, saying that they are not involved in day-to-day running.

Though they are not in operation, but any influence of these independent directors in the decision making process of business towards profits, cost cutting measures, etc will have a direct bearing on the safety measures followed by plant operators and thus they are involved indirectly in day-to-day running of the plant. Therefore, it is not correct to exclude them from liability. If they are like ordinary public shareholders and not consulted or involved in any decision making process (in finance, technical,...), then they can be excluded.

All those who are involved in decision making of financial aspects should be made liable for accidents. The deactivation of safety systems at Bhopal was done to cut business losses with the assumption that a plant not in operation does not require maintenance of safety systems. The decision was made because of lack of technical knowledge on what can go wrong.

Any financial decision on plant operations should be supported by a report from operations in-charge (who should be a technical man) that was discussed by all directors and approved.

Road rage

There was a news report on 20.06.2010 in which a promising actor died in a road accident. He was driving a bike. Suddenly a van entered the main road from a side road. The bike driver could not control his vehicle and in the collision, he died.

It is common for people drive vehicles at very high speed. Everyday, people die in road accidents and is common to see a full page of such accident reports in news papers.

Driving the vehicles at speeds which they can't control is wrong in the first place. Then, not following road discipline is another worst factor. People entering main roads do not slow down to see a clear road and instead enter the road at the same speed as they are driving and thus unnerve the drivers on the main road. Most of the accidents are due to entry of vehicles from side roads or vehicles slowing down suddenly in the same lane without indication or taking turns from extreme left to right without watching for vehicles coming behind.

Our roads are not racing tracks. It is proper if the bikes above 100 cc are banned. Similarly, four wheelers of high engine capacity should be banned so that vehicle speed can be limited to 50 kmph. All side roads should have speed breakers before they join the main road. The road dividers should of such height that nobody can use them to cross the road.

As someone suggested in a TV discussion programme, the licence of the vehicle drivers involved in accidents should be cancelled and drivers without licence should be imprisoned to reduce the accidents. Similarly, the pedestrians crossing the roads as they please should be fined heavily. I observed a few times that the pedestrians crossing the road wave their fingers to motorists. These people do not have sense that even if a motorist sees them, he may hit before slowing down the vehicle.