What the Circus taught us

By David Jamieson, Salus Technical

How often do you think there is a hydrocarbon release offshore each year? How many offshore inspections significantly fall below the standard expected by the regulations?

The answers may shock you. There is a release on average once every three years. One in four inspections find aspects significantly under-par.

Despite this, when surveyed, two-thirds of managers in the energy industry revealed that there had been safety training cancelled or delayed at their company due to the pandemic. We know that the pandemic has also had a negative impact on competency management and maintenance backlog.

But this story can have a happy ending. Every single one of us has the power to make a positive process safety impact and reduce the risk of major accidents. 

Enter Joseph Strauss. If his project only killed 34 people, it would've been deemed a success, from a safety perspective. He was responsible for building the Golden Gate Bridge in 1933. At the time, the standard for safety was that for every $1 million you spend, you should expect one fatality. Having spent $35 million, they came to reason that those 34 deaths would be a relatively small fatality figure.

Joseph had other ideas, though. He wanted this project to be the exception despite the age-old excuse of lack of money to invest in improving safety standards. He introduced the compulsory use of wearing a hard hat, implemented strict site discipline, and not only this, but this was the first to introduce safety nets after a visit to the local circus had inspired him. The nets were a success, soon patented by the company and used throughout construction projects even to this day, almost 90 years later.

19 men fell into the nets accidentally, yet none of them died. That's a step change in safety.

Fortunately, we are working at a time where there are far higher safety standards, but at a time not without incident. Unfortunately, many thousands of lives have been lost following major accidents across many industries. I like to think about Joseph Strauss and the way he sought to raise the bar and improve, to never accept that a small number of fatalities is okay.

He was able to look at the risk, understand what the risk was, and then take the action needed to raise the bar. In Salus Technical’s online course, we invite attendees to also think of how they can emulate Joseph Strauss' mindset and raise the bar.

We shouldn’t wait for someone else to take action. Every single one of us has the power to make that change to prevent major accidents.

Salus Technical have built an online Process Safety Awareness course that gives individuals and companies the tools that they need to help prevent major accidents. The training is online and covers all of the key aspects of Process Safety and gives actionable advice that can be applied from day one.

Read the latest issue of the OGV Energy magazine HERE