The importance of “never skipping steps”
is always talked about when we meet with maintenance workers. To emphasize this
point we talk about specific incidents that have been posted on the Aluminium
Plant Safety Blog. We find that when worker's can read (e.g., slide), view
(e.g., tv news video) and hear of a recent incident they can put themselves in
the injured or deceased workers place it reinforces the safety message
that their employer is putting forth. Here is a recent story that will be
discussed on our future travels:
A United Kingdom recycling company
has been fined after a worker was injured whilst repairing a shredder.
The Magistrates’ Court heard how, in Fall 2013, a plant
mechanic employed by the recycling company in the process of repairing a
shredding machine after the metal plate forming the roof of the hammer drum had
become detached. The worker was kneeling on a conveyor belt inside the shredder
when it restarted and he was thrown from the machine. He suffered a fractured
right leg and left arm.
An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE)
found that the company did not have adequate or suitable systems in place to
protect the health and safety of their employees, including failing to enforce
the ‘safe stop’ process which should be followed when using dangerous
machinery. The company had allowed unchallenged poor practice to become the
norm.
The recycling company was fined over £300,000 after
pleading guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc.
Act 1974.
We pray that the worker has fully
recovered from his physical injuries. We also hope the injured worker was
offered mental health counseling to deal this traumatic incident. Hopefully the
recycling company corrected their training and procedures to prevent an
incident such as this from occurring again.
We explain to all workers who have to
perform safe isolation or lock out tag out procedures that one skipped step may
result in themselves being injured or killed. Or worse yet their mistake could
result in the injury or death of a coworker. This realization that a worker’s
action can kill someone else can be a sobering fact. But it's true. Sadly, we know of
numerous incidents where a worker’s unintentional actions result in the injury
or death of their coworker(s). Those unintentional actions occurred when a worker
failed to follow their training, skipped steps, or made an assumption. That is
why we always highlight the importance of following your training, never skip
steps, and never make assumptions. Finally we show this animation in our
presentations to emphasize the simple action of pushing the on/off button to
confirm that the lockout procedures have eliminated the potential stored energy.
The simple action of pressing the on/off button could have prevented numerous injuries and fatalities involving lock out tag out.
The Aluminium Times Magazine had an article about this hazard:
For our Portuguese readers:
The Aluminium Times Magazine had an article about this hazard:
For our Portuguese readers:
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