By Heather Douglas
Ask any CEO who doesn’t want to face the cameras because of a safety incident during a plant turnaround, what his or her top priority is. Unequivocally, that person will tell you it’s to ensure the health and safety of all workers involved. Often workers need to clean and repair equipment in confined spaces by themselves, inspect towers, or fix electrical outlets in basements.
Each person needs to be reminded of all the potential safety hazards:
• Exposure – workers need to be aware of potentially encountering toxic chemicals, flammable gases, fumes, hydrogen sulphide, and other contaminants. Most companies employ outside specialists to deal with asbestos, PCBs lead, mercury, or repair catalysts beds.
• Equipment collapse – sometimes shutdowns happen early because a piece of equipment is defective, leaks, or could topple over. Workers need to ensure everything is structurally sound and not a danger to operators.
• Electrical hazards – workers need to unplug electrical equipment before repairs to prevent shocks and worse.
• Collisions – often large machinery is brought on-site to move equipment and drivers should be aided by workers outside the vehicle when their views are obstructed by other large equipment.
• Proper storage – workers need to account for all hazardous and dangerous materials and then ensure each is correctly labelled and stored. Air and gas cylinders need to be checked and then stored with the main valves closed, the regulators removed, and safety caps installed.
• Worker slips and falls – workers can slip, trip, and fall on wet or damp floors and these make up a surprising percentage of Worker’s Compensation Claims in Canada.
CEOs often lose sleep during shutdowns, worrying about all that could go wrong. They want all STOs to run smoothly, have no lost-time accidents, and finish on-time and on-budget. They understand that shrewd investors care about the number of injuries, mounting medical costs, poor safety records because those usually signal lawsuits and damaging publicity.
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