All injuries are preventable. If you really think about it, if everyone did everything they were supposed to do accidents probably would never happen.
Sure equipment fails, or gets worn out and fails, or tires blow out when you run over a nail, but think about it: That nail maybe wouldn’t be on the road if a worker hadn’t left a box of nails on the bed of their truck then drove away with the tailgate down. That machine would not have failed if it were replaced 2 years ago when the maintenance worker told his supervisor that this machine was old, outdated, and had “a few years left.”
Tracy Morgan Accident, Like Most Accidents, Was Preventable
Think about what happened to comedian Tracy Morgan. This is all alleged at the time I write this, but allegedly the semi-truck driver was up for 24 hours before he crashed into the back of Morgan’s limo. The truck driver is a Wal-Mart employee. No doubt he will have a great defense counsel when this goes to trial, but what if that were your truck driver out there that caused this accident? Do you know how many hours your drivers are logging behind the wheel? Are they compliant with all their reporting of work versus rest periods? How can you really prove they are being truthful and honest should this situation result from your employee? If you are not sure, I hope you have deep pockets to provide as good of a defense counsel as this driver is going to get.
Time and time again, we see injuries that are preventable. Most of these injuries get chalked up to “operator error” meaning that this worker knew better than to do what they were doing at the time they were injured. This could be from trying to lift too much, or pull too much in one load, or from operating a machine in the improper manner.
The Belt Sander That Luckily Missed
For example, I saw an injury the other day in which one machine operator lucked out. He was using a big stationary belt sander, to clean and smooth the edges on some metal pieces he was working on. This is a vertical sander, meaning the belt runs up and down, and the operator holds the piece of metal and pushes it into the belt to obtain the desired result.
Instead of holding the piece vertically like you are supposed to, he was holding it horizontally. When you hold it horizontally, to work on one edge you have to tilt the piece up. What he forgot to realize was by tilting the piece up, his hands were extremely close to the moving belt. The piece caught in the tiny gap between the platform and the belt, and the force of the spinning belt pulled his hands right in to it.
He was very lucky in a sense that he escaped with only some bad abrasions and a few fractured fingers. It surely could have been much worse had his fingers been pulled down and jammed into the platform or had he not had gloves on at the time.
But questions begged to be asked. Why was he doing this and holding the part horizontally? Who trained him on how to use this sander? Where was his supervisor, and why was he not seen operating this equipment in an unsafe manner?
This is a 100% preventable injury. I’m sure the person reading this right now can think of many claims that resulted from something that should have been preventable in the first place. Think of the costs associated with claims that should have never happened in the first place.
“Operator Error” Should Not Fully Be Blamed On Operator
Every risk manager’s excuse is that it was “operator error” or just overall “bad judgment” on the part of the injured worker. But I look at the greater cause of the injury which is the worker themselves. They know better than to use equipment improperly, so why do they do it in the first place?
The answer is that nobody has ever caught them cutting corners. Plus even if they were caught, no discipline was ever handed down to them. So if they are not disciplined, what incentive do they have to change their dangerous ways?
They are only going to keep getting lucky for so long. Chances are this belt sander guy learned his lesson, and when he is back to work he will use the sander correctly for a while, until he goes back to his old ways.
Every single business out there that has employees on the road for any type of business should take this Tracy Morgan accident as a brutal wake-up call. No worker wakes up one day and thinks they are going to get behind the wheel of their truck or car and kill somebody.
Hold Workers Accountable To Safety And Discipline Unsafe Acts
At the end of the day, your workers have to be held accountable for their own actions, and they need to be disciplined for unsafe acts. The chain of command and accountability has to be there. Workers are held accountable for their actions, supervisors are held accountable for their workers under their supervision, and so on up the ladder.
The failure is when one level of management does not act properly in stopping an unsafe act to begin with. If you as business owners and decision-makers do not step in, you cannot afford to turn a blind eye to whatever problem you are facing.
The cost of replacing an unsafe machine or the cost of making sure your workers are complaint with whatever safety protocol you have is not worth the cost of someone being seriously injured, or worse, losing their life.
Author Michael B. Stack, CPA, Principal, Amaxx Risk Solutions, Inc. is an expert in employer communication systems and part of the Amaxx team helping companies reduce their workers compensation costs by 20% to 50%. He is a writer, speaker, and website publisher. www.reduceyourworkerscomp.com. Contact: [email protected].
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