SAFETY


THOUGHTS ON MAINTENANCE SAFETY AND TRAINING


One of my favorite expressions comes from the use of a “petard,” a device invented in the sixteenth century. The expression is to “be hoisted by your own petard.” The word is French and refers to a shaped bomb used to breach the walls of a fortified structure. I guess being blown up by your own petard was common enough to make it an expression. I don’t think there is anyone that wouldn’t agree that despite our efforts, most of our mistakes have been made before and will likely be


38 DOMmagazine.com | feb 2020


made again. An operational example of such an error might be wire strikes during helicopter operations. During maintenance, failures to properly torque a jam nut or clear an area of foreign objects falls into this category of errors. We all need to recognize that it is much more difficult to put safety into practice than it is to talk about safety improvements. We must be keenly aware of the need for ways to minimize risks to people and equipment and also ways to provide institutional safety management. Too


BY JON ROBBINS | CONTRIBUTING WRITER


often we think of maintenance safety as beginning on the shop floor rather than in the office of the CEO. When the CEO stands in front of everyone and says, “Safety is job No. 1,” and then returns to his or her office with no further impact on policy, a huge part of the safety equation can go unsolved. A safety inspector might be able to check the boxes showing that all the firefighting equipment is in place and properly maintained — but if the insides of the refinery pipes are old and corroded, the


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