Construction Safety 4
D G
1. Accidents should be investigated as soon as possible. Companies should have an Emergency Action Plan (EAP) in place and be tailored to the job site location. It is vital to conduct an investigation immediately to gather the facts and documents on the appropriate OSHA forms. Investigating almost immediately helps the witnesses and those involved recall the facts and allows for the documentation to be more accurate.
2. Morgan is correct. Every company needs to be prepared and have their own Emergency Action Plan for each specific job site. This is a step in having companies more confident in their employees so they'll know what to do in the event of an emergency. Emergency evacuations exit routes need to be available and visible to employees and will not be the same per job site. Therefor, a company-wide plan that can be easily customized is an excellent idea. Being a proactive company and having safety practices will ensure routine for your employees. In turn, they'll be more confident in taking part of the Emergency Plan and take pride in a leadership role.
F O
1. An accident should be investigated as soon as all emergency procedures have been accomplished. This should provide accurate information. The What, should be figure out the cause of the accident. This includes the type of work being done, or what the employee was doing prior to the accident occurring. The text states that these types of investigations should never be about faultfinding. They should be to find the cause and to provide corrective action so that it will not happen again. The person that typically conducts the investigation is a supervisor, or a higher level executive, depending on the severity of the accident. Larger companies on larger projects usually have several safety managers in place.
2. I would agree with Morgan. It is extremely important for companies to have a universal emergency response plan in place. Yes, each project may be different but like Morgan states, a plan that is job specific needs to be put in place. No emergency plan will simply call for disorganization during an emergency which can make matters worse if no one knows what to do.
J C
1. Accident investigation should occur once the emergency response plan has been implemented. During the emergency response plan a few critical tasks should occur prior to investigating. First, the site should be made safe and in the case of an injury, the injured should receive immediate care if possible while simultaneously calling for 911. The site should be locked down and witnesses should remain in the area. Once the injured is cared for and help is on the way, then the general contractor’s team can begin the investigation.
When investing, only the facts should be considered to find the root cause. The text states that the type of work should be known, what the person was doing, the equipment being used and if protective equipment was being used. There are other several other questions as stated in the text that should be asked when conducting the investigation. It is highly critical that only the facts are considered when investigating.
Individuals that should investigate the accident include the General Contractors team, superintendent or project manager. If the team contains a safety supervisor, the safety supervisor should be involved in conducting the investigation.
2. Martin is wrong.
A one in a thousand emergency is more than enough odds to have a response plan. Dialing 911 may not be enough in order to potentially save a life. If an injured worker is in critical condition, they may require immediate action to be cleared from the hazard or to sustain the injured worker until help arrives. Also, depending on the size of the project, it would be the responsibility of the General Contractor to secure the site and ensure that help has the means to access the site. It would also be important to keep everyone on site at a designated rally point so that the team can conduct the accident investigation. Depending on the severity of the accident, media may be arriving with questions that will need to be carefully answered. The project team should be prepared to answer questions that would not release inaccurate information until the investigation has occurred. The general contractor executives would also need to be contacted so that they may begin involving lawyers in the event that litigation may occur. There are numerous reasons to have an emergency response plan in place and known by all. There are very few to not have a plan in place.
Morgan is correct.
Having a standardized comprehensive plan ensures that everyone on the team knows how to react in the event of the emergency. Everyone, including employees should know what actions to take during an emergency. All should be assigned a role and know what to do in order to effectively execute the response plan. With a standardized plan in place, anyone on the project team can know what to do from project to project.
M C
1. An accident should be investigated right away. The reason behind this is to investigate what happened and how it happened. An accident, or “incident” how OSHA prefers to call it, needs to be investigated by someone or a group of people experienced in causation models and investigative techniques. A person with interpersonal techniques that are effective can facilitate interviewing processes. The idea of an investigation is mainly because this way it will not happen again in the future, also to have record on how much an accident could cost and to see how the process of claims for workers’ compensation. An investigation can also occur when a minor incident happens and this is to avoid a bigger accident to happen. Someone conducting the investigation can be a supervisor, safety officer, “outside experts” or a representative from local government or police. Part of the process of investigation is to gather evidence, gather and interview witnesses.
2. I think Martin is wrong and Morgan is right. Developing a comprehensive plan for emergency can uncover hazardous conditions that were not previously identified. Having a drill and help understand those hazardous conditions and find a way to fix them before the actual accident happens. Having a plan is mostly to create a safe workplace and awareness. Having a plan will help in make rapid decisions in a short amount of time because when a person is in an accident stress can affect their judgement on making good decisions.
https://www.ccohs.ca/oshanswers/hsprograms/investig.html
J W
1. As Goetsch (2013) suggests, accident investigations should begin immediately after emergency procedures have been accomplished. The idea is to collect as many accurate facts as possible about the accident in terms of causes. This should be the investigation’s primary focus. The “who should investigate” depends on the severity of the accident. In most cases, the immediate supervisor should lead the investigation. If the company employs a health/safety professional, they should also assist. With more serious incidents, the health/safety professional should lead the investigation team with support from company senior leadership. The “why’s” of an investigation are as follows:
a. If you wait too long to begin an investigation, many pertinent facts may be forgotten or communicated inaccurately.
b. Delays could also lead to the alteration of the accident site itself which could mislead investigators in the true root cause of the incident.
c. The immediacy of an investigation also applies to ‘near misses.’ By taking swift action to investigate immediately, it also sends the message to all those in the organization that accidents are serious and important to the leadership within the firm.
2. I would agree with Morgan’s point of view in general. The company should develop a company-wide emergency plan that can efficiently be customized specifically to the job-site location across the states. It’s reasonable to agree that an expeditious emergency response to a situation can possible yield less injury or property damage in many occasions. One way to ensure expedient and efficiency response to emergencies is to practice, evaluate and modify the plan if needed. This is virtually impossible without a customized plan for each job site. It’s all about preparation as Morgan mentions. Another point to mention, however, is that if a company uses or works near hazardous chemicals, (SARA) or Title III of the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act mandates that an ERP is in place with specific components. A comprehensive site-specific emergency response plan that is routinely practiced can help ensure quick, orchestrated, smooth responses to emergencies no matter where the job is located. This planning would truly lead to less severe injuries and/or property damage.
References
Goetsch, David L. (2013). Construction Safety and Health, 2nd Edition. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc
1. Accidents should be investigated right away after the injured person has been taken care of in order to interview witness and so that they have everything fresh in their mind to not lose any details on what happened. When interviewing the witnesses very detailed questions should be asked so that every single detail can be investigated so that the problem can be solved to prevent it from happening again. Every company is different in regards to who investigates, it could be the supervisor, a safety officer or someone could be hired to do the investigation but no matter who, someone should always investigate right away. The reason why it is very important to investigate is so that the problem can be fixed and a plan can be made to prevent any accident from happening again.
2. Morgan is right because a comprehensive safety plan is very important in any company no matter the industry. When having a plan written out it will help workers understand better the risks of the job and it will also teach them what to do in case of an accident. No company should ever say it is a waste of time doing one because it involves the life’s of the workers. Also no company should ever wait for an accident to happen in order to take action.