Terrorism Comes To Our Industry....How Will We Respond?

Our industry is not immune to workplace violence. The Aluminium Plant Safety Blog has posted incidents involving bomb threats (here) and workplace violence (here, here) over the past two years. Those incidents are only a few of what has occurred in our industry. Over the past 20 years the responsibilities of the safety officer have expanded exponentially. Here is a story involving terrorism that emphasizes the importance of safety departments in our industry:

During the week of March 30, 2014, the Tajikistan Interior Ministry detained a gang in Tursunzoda city located 60 km west of Dushanbe, where the Central Asian largest aluminium plant of the state unitary enterprise Tajik Aluminium Company (TALCO) is located, the Ministry told CA-News on Tuesday. An impressive amount of TNT was found and seized from the detainees, the law enforcement body said. According to unconfirmed reports, the group intended to detonate the TALCO plant. Reportedly, the group included several employees of the aluminum company, who already give testimony. Tajik Aluminium Plant is an aluminium smelter in Tajikistan on the border with Uzbekistan. The Tajik aluminium plant was officially renamed as Tajik Aluminium Company (TALCO) in 2007. The main product is the primary aluminium, 98% of which is exported annually. Design capacity – 517,000 tons per year. The factory -----employs more than 10,000 people.

Here is another media story:

DUSHANBE -- Tajikistan's security services have reportedly prevented a terrorist act at the TALCO company, the largest aluminum plant in Central Asia. 

Interior Ministry spokesman Jaloliddin Sadriddinov told journalists in Dushanbe on April 9 that a criminal group that planned a large explosion at the plant was detained last week with explosives in their possession.

No further details were released. An employee of the facility, who asked not to be named, told RFE/RL that four members of the group were TALCO employees.

The plant is located in the town of Tursunzade, 60 kilometers west of the capital, Dushanbe.

Tajik President Emomali Rahmon personally controls the operations of the plant, which is considered to be Tajikistan's main industrial asset.

The APSB wishes that our industry would be immune from terrorism and workplace violence. Unfortunately our wishes will never come true.

Our hope with this post as with every other post on this blog is that awareness of these incidents brings education. In the vast majority of our industry, terrorism affecting an individual plant is an unthinkable event. But, as history has shown us terrorism and workplace violence has occurred, and will occur in the future affecting every corner of our industry.

How will we respond? Why we? Because the aluminium industry has had a rich history of sharing safety information. It is that history that we should be proud of. It is that history that we should not forget. It is that history that should guide us in the future.

Our industry is one of the few if not the only industry where companies have shared information after an injury or a fatality investigation. Why would a company share some of their darkest history? Because, it saves lives.

Unfortunately, there has been a growing number of companies that refuse to share information after an injury or a fatality investigation. This is a dangerous new trend in our field (which has to end!). There are a myriad of reasons why some companies have decided not to share information, from protecting a company's public image to a fear that they will worsen the inevitable lawsuit that will be filed on behalf of the injured or deceased worker. This self-imposed isolation not only leads to an overall decline in the company’s safety but puts at risk the entire industry. Looking back the aluminium industry had those same fears about openly discussing molten metal water explosions. It was only after a series of catastrophes that the industry realized that the sharing of information could save lives and prevent injuries.

The APSB hopes that this incident (though it was prevented) serves as a wake-up call for our industry to talk among ourselves and learn from each other on how to prevent/deal with terrorism and workplace violence (as well other hazards). 

Please comment.