Lab safety - CSB advice

Safety is talked much in industries and followed to some extent. But, the research facilities and academic institutions, where experiments are carried out, this important activity is normally left to the wisdom of the individuals. No study is carried out about hazards in the experiments.

Chemical Safety Board of US recommends the following for improving lab safety.

1. Laboratory safety management plans must include physical as well as chemical exposure hazards.
2. Institutions should ensure that research-specific hazards are evaluated and mitigated.
3. Laboratory researchers need guidance documents to help manage hazardous chemicals that are unique to their research environments.
4. Research-specific written protocols and training are necessary to manage laboratory research risk.
5. Academic institutions must ensure that safety inspectors report directly to those with authority to implement improvements.
6. Incidents and near-misses should be documented, tracked, and communicated.

The full article can be read here. http://pubs.acs.org/cen/government/89/8943gov1.html

Chlorine leaks - impact on people's lives

Following is link that depicts shattering of many lives in US and this is true wherever chlorine and other chemicals are handled.

http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/2011/chlorine-accidents

Instantaneous release of chlorine from normal tonners containing about 900 kg chlorine can impact living beings even at a distance of 10 km under worst conditions i.e overcast sky, no wind; with fatalities upto 1 km. Unless otherwise the safe handling procedures are not practiced, these chemicals are much danger than explosives that affect people and property only upto few meters whereas these chemical releases impact persons staying even hundreds of meters away.

How to Measure the ROI of Your Safety Program

A link on measuring payback from safety program implementation is available below.
How to Measure the ROI of Your Safety Program

Though, many times it is difficult to calculate the money spent on safety program,cost of accident, benefits accrued by implementation of safety programme, with extra efforts one can calculate and prove that the organization benefits from a safety programme that gets wholehearted support from all.

The link for indicators to be observed is given below. Meaningful quantification of these indicators can help in calculating cost benefits to the organization.

http://www.safetyxchange.org/financing-safety/achievementbased-safety-metrics?utm_source=emailmarketer&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=3802

Hot water causes death of a boy

An young boy died from scalds due to fall of hot water bucket while playing nearby. The boy died two days after the incident while undergoing treatment. Many such incidents occurred as hot containers are within the easy access of innocent children who are not aware of the hazards. Neither the elders take care to keep such containers at height nor have watchful eye on the toddlers.
It may be noted that skin can withstand temperature only upto 42oC. Hot water at 70oC in 1 sec causes a complete loss of skin thickness in adults and 0.5 sec in kids (skin has cooling mechanism like blood circulation, sweating).

The remedial measures to be taken can be found in internet. One such link is listed below.
http://www.burnremedies.com/Scald-Burn.html

NDMA Guidelines and videos

Various guidelines of National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) on floods, tsunamis, earth quakes, chemical disasters, chemical terrorism, etc and videos can be found at the following links.
http://ndma.gov.in/ndma/guidelines.html
http://ndma.gov.in/ndma/videogallery.html

Honey bee attack - death of a boy

A boy died as his friends threw stones at a honey beehive and the disturbed bees attacked the boy nearby. It is common to see beehives outside many buildings and innocent persons become victims and many such incidents were reported in the press. As a student I heard an incident in which a person was attacked on the head by bees and there after the person used to cover the head with a cloth because of less hair. These beehives can be safely removed by getting expert help from pest control shops and is better to plan such activity when it is a weekend holiday.

http://ibnlive.in.com/generalnewsfeed/news/boy-dies-after-attack-by-bees/851830.html

Lessons from Fukushima incident - A report at HSE.GOV.UK

Y'day (11.10.2011), a report (6.24 MB) from HM Chief Nuclear Inspector on lessons from Fukushima and implications for the UK nuclear industry is made available. One can draw lessons for their own organization from similar incidents. A video (41.4 MB) from the Chief Nuclear Inspector is also available.
Report:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/nuclear/fukushima/final-report.htm

Video:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/nuclear/fukushima/final-report-video.htm

Gas leak - six injured

An incident of gas leak and explosion was reported in the newspaper. Not knowing about the gas leak, in the early hours, the person lit a match stick to light a beedi that resulted an explosion with a loud sound and injured six in the house. An adjacent wall of the room collapsed in the incident.

As per another version in another newspaper, the house wife called her husband after smelling the leaking gas, who lit a match stick to see the gas leak.

Normally, there will be reports of cylinder explosion or stove explosion. But, in this report, it is clearly stated that the gas leaked, found ignition source, gas caught fire and exploded.

The incident is a lesson to learn about safe handling procedure for gas leak. After getting the gas smell, one should not switch ON or OFF the electrical appliances, open the windows and doors to allow escape of gas, take the cylinder to open area away from the residential buildings or cover the gas cylinder with a wet cloth, caution others about gas leak and avoid ignition sources and then call the gas cylinder supplier for necessary help.

Communication gap-Overhead electrical car rams trolley in a tunnel - 5 deaths

An overhead electrical (OHE) car that went for electrical track repairs rams a push-pull trolley with a supervisor and 4 gangmen who were on the daily check of the track. It is reported that it happened at a turning in the tunnel where gangmen might be unable to see the head lamp of the OHE car, unable to hear the sound because of electrically operated car and that there are no signals to use walkie-talkies being carried by both parties. Further there is communication gap between these parties and the adjacent station master. The OHE car was going towards Araku and is on downward gradient while the trolley was coming from Tyda. It is lack of understanding as two parties moving in opposite directions on the same track for the assigned jobs.
The news item can be read here (::The Hans India::).
http://www1.lite.epaper.timesofindia.com/mobile.aspx?article=yes&pageid=8&edlabel=TOIH&mydateHid=06-10-2011&pubname=Times+of+India+-+Hyderabad+-+Times+City&edname=&articleid=Ar00800&format=&publabel=TOI&max=true
LINK

4shared folder - Safety Videos to Share

4shared folder - Safety Videos to Share

LINK