Inside this issue...

• 4 reasons to secure the scene of an incident
• So it turns out the incident occurs because of employee error...
• Bonus tip

I imagine you’ve noticed a theme in the last few bulletins: Incidents, and all the issues surrounding your compliance if these occur at workplace.

Picture this...

You run an engineering company. You haven’t repaired one of your boilers as frequently as you should. Its steel door shoots off and flies through your factory! It cuts open three employees’ heads and one of their stomachs, killing them instantly.

This happened to an engineering firm in Roodekop last week. It’s yet another example of how quickly a fault in a piece of machinery can translate into multiple fatalities, and an incident your company could now be liable for. This is particularly if you didn’t do recent maintenance on the machine, and still expected your employees to continue using it. You could incur strict liability (meaning “of guilty mind”).

4 reasons to secure the scene of an incident

After every incident, you need to secure the area where it happened. You do this to ensure that:

• More people aren’t injured or exposed to something that will cause adverse health effects;
• There’ll be no additional damage to your product, service, equipment or property;
• Other people, e.g. members of the public, their property or neighbouring businesses aren’t harmed; and
• You protect the evidence that will help you to determine the basic and root cause of the incident.

For an incident like the one above, securing the scene would require you to activate your emergency response plan.

How to secure the scene of a serious/major injury or illness, including fatalities

Example:

There’s a major explosion in an electrical transformer while your maintenance crew is doing a routine service. One person dies and three others sustain multiple injuries, including severe burns and shock.

You must:

• Isolate electrical power supply to the area
• Extinguish the fire
• Provide first aid to the injured people and arrange for transfer to the hospital
• Inform the police and Department of Labour
• When authorised, arrange for the removal of the body.
• Barricade the area so no unauthorised persons can enter. This enables you to

• Await the Department of Labour inspector and authorisation to clear the incident scene once he’s completed his inspection

So it turns out the incident occurs because of employee error...

You fire your employee immediately!

Don’t! There are processes and procedures you MUST follow for each and every dismissal. How closely you follow them can’t depend on how guilty the employee is. There can be absolutely no exceptions.

But, what do health and safety people know about labour issues?

Here at FSP we’re aware that you can’t be an expert in every position in your company, so we’ve asked experts in each field to assist you to ensure you don’t appear before courts and other official bodies for the wrong reasons.

The CCMA is just such an institute you want to avoid. You do this by ensuring you follow every law to the letter. Even if you do occasionally have to appear in future, you’ll be secure in the knowledge that you’ve done everything correctly. The CCMA for Managers is your ticket...

Bonus tip:

You can prevent most incidents by following the safety measures you’ve set out in your risk assessment!

In the name of safety,

Christel Fouché

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More Health & Safety topics and recent updates...

Take a look at some of the most popular past articles:

    * 6 emergency lighting prescriptions 
    * The 5 most costly labour mistakes made by employers... and how to avoid them 
    * 10 tips to conduct a perfect workplace inspection 
    * Avoid Costly Inspections with Your Own Personal 24/7 Health and Safety Advisor