MEMIC Safety Blog

The Price of Paying Attention

I received a message recently from fellow MEMIC Safety Management Consultant, Greg LaRochelle. Greg’s note touches on the human side of employee health and safety. You may have seen the term ‘safety culture’ on this blog several times before, but Greg’s point goes beyond the culture aspect and into safety consciousness.  All the training, processes and disciplinary actions in place in a workplace pale in comparison when your workers take appropriate steps to protect themselves and others.

Greg recently caught a story on the evening news about a teenage boy who was struck by a fast-moving train while rushing to school one morning.  The student, in a hurry and wearing his new iPod, took the chance of crossing the railroad tracks with the barriers in the down position.  In a split second, he was clipped by an oncoming train and was tossed roughly 20 feet into a snow bank.  He sustained multiple injuries, including broken leg bones which have required five surgeries.  Fortunately, he is recovering well but faces intensive physical therapy to get back on his feet.  Remarkably, the young man has a positive outlook and has commented that he learned a big lesson on the importance of paying attention. 

The news story compelled Greg to write to me, as this lad’s remarkable experience and post-accident revelation rings true not only in the workplace, but in everyday life.  An organization can have a comprehensive health and safety management system, complete with all the needed policies and procedures, hazard analyses, and controls in place, including physical safeguards and personal protective equipment. But the key ingredient to safety success is the employee’s alertness to his/her surroundings and focus on the task at hand.  Employees need to be conscious at all times of steering clear of the “line of fire,” stemming from the point of operation.  In this age of electronic gadgets, financial worries, and new struggles unfolding, it remains paramount that we pay close attention to what’s happening right in front of us. When we lose track of these things, it could hit us like a moving train with serious and long-lasting consequences.

I am positive we have all been in a hurry and distracted by a piece of technology and realized our near-miss accident. I encourage you to share your stories with us, so we all may listen and learn and take heed of our tasks at hand.

The Big Chill Approaches

The temperature atop Mt. Washington in the White Mountains of New Hampshire hit 25 degrees below zero last Monday. And, with wind gusts over 100 miles per hour, the wind chill stood at minus-65 to minus 70 degrees. The scary part, pointed out by the weather observers stationed there, is this – it’s not even winter yet!

Yes, it’s been getting colder for the last few weeks but one thing is for sure -- it's going to get colder. Maybe not Mt. Washington cold, but definitely colder. It's a fact of life that many workers have to deal with.  For some workers it may be a minor nuisance because they're not out all day. For others, it could cost them a finger or toe from frostbite.  In extreme cases, some workers lives will be threatened.

The amount of protection a worker requires depends on the amount of exposure to the cold. With any employee safety concern, you should evaluate the workplace conditions to accurately assess the situation. From there, proper training should be done for all employees, including monitoring their actions and taking corrective actions when needed. This is your best means of incident prevention.

It’s also useful to contact an expert on the topic. Here at MEMIC, we are fortunate to have a cold weather expert on staff.

Peter Koch, a MEMIC Safety Specialist, has been working with ski areas who are insured with MEMIC for years. Before that, he worked in the ski industry. An obvious exposure these employers are faced with is working in some extreme cold conditions.  Much of the information Peter uses to train ski industry employees can be applied to numerous other jobs that require employees to be outdoors.  Here's a newsletter that Pete put together (Download The Cold Challenge newsletter ). Not only is it useful for supervisors to evaluate their workplaces, but it is also a great safety meeting topic.  And, of course, it is important to note that knowledge of cold weather exposure is equally important for anyone participating in outdoor recreation during wintertime.