Safety tips for handling energy sources onboard
Electrical energy on board ships can be hazardous. Machinery, equipment, and systems found aboard a ship differ substantially from those found in landside facilities of general industry. They often lack individual disconnect or cut-off mechanisms that provide complete isolation from other machinery. Properly isolating and controlling energy sources is critical to ensuring that seafarers and others stay safe.
Lockout/tag out operations (LOTO) apply whenever a service, inspection or maintenance requires the disabling or removal of normal guards and safety devices during unexpected startup of the machinery, equipment or the release of energy could cause injury. Potential resources of hazardous energy include, but are not limited to electrical, hydraulic, pneumatic, fluid thermal, chemical or mechanical.
Responsibilities
The Master is responsible to inform all shipboard personnel about these instructions and make sure they become familiar with them. The Responsible Officer (C/O and/or C/E) must ensure the implementation of these instructions and for maintaining the appropriate log on the work procedures to be followed. Finally, he/she is the Officer responsible for issuing the permit.
It is responsibility of the crewmembers to report unsafe or unusable equipment to the Master or Watch Officer and they should ensure that equipment which has been identified as being not fit for service is locked out or tagged out as appropriate. The key responsible person for the lockout/tag out of the electrical equipment should ensure that each seafarer working on any electrical piece of equipment,
112 | The Report • June 2023 • Issue 104
requiring control of hazardous energy, is instructed in the lockout/ tag out process.
How to conduct LOTO
Lockout/tag out devices needed for lockout/tag out shall be readily available for use aboard each vessel. General requirements for locks and tags are as follows:
- Seafarers involved in working on a piece of equipment requiring to be locked out, shall carry a unique key where no one else’s key can open the other employee’s safety padlocks.
- The removal of a lock or tag by a person other than the one who original placed the lock or tag into service, is strictly prohibited. The only person who may remove a
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