What Is Safety

[KenB259]

I was part of a group today that was asked this rather unassuming question. Answers ran the gamut such as being aware of your surroundings, knowing the limitation of your tools etc. The best answer, in my opinion, was pretty simple, yet pretty thought provoking. They said more often than not safety is a choice. We make a choice when we decide to move that little cutoff away from a spinning blade or when we decide to clean off a spinning drill bit with our fingernail or other stupid things we might be guilty of. Just food for thought.

 

[monophoto]

Ken

That's probably correct.

I have a number of friends who are safety professionals, and in hearing them talk, one conclusion that I've arrived at is that in almost every instance where someone has come up on the wrong side of safety, they later acknowledged that they knew that what they were doing was not right but thought that they could get away with making that one exception. So yes, that sounds to me like its a matter of choice.

 

[Woodchipper]

"It won't happen to me but happens to other people."

 

[Fine Engineer]

Occasionally one gets bit by something they weren't expecting (lack of training generally), but I'd agree with you guys that safety is nearly always a decision. One almost always knows if something is hazardous before doing it. This isn't even specific to shop processes with machines that are known to be potentially dangerous, but applies to household tasks as well. In too many cases the safety procedure is perceived as slower, more complex, or most often, slower than just 'doing it'. It is a tough mindset to overcome - look how long it took for auto and motorcycle racing to really embrace safety equipment and processes.

 

[RDHals]

I myself am a safety professional. I've been investigating mishaps for over 25 years and I could tell you some stories that make you hurt just listening to them. When you investigate a mishap you weed through a lot of stuff to get to the root cause. Once you get past the excuses, and blaming equipment or distractions. More often then not when you've gotten to the root cause it's due to a simple choice someone made that began a chain of events leading to the mishap. And in todays world where so much information is at everyone's finger tips ignorance of the safe way to do things or procedure is also a choice.

 

[RunnerVince]

This applies not only to safety, but simply best practices. Almost every time I ruin a project of any kind, I find myself telling my wife "I knew better, but did it anyway."

I'd say about half of the cases are from just being in a rush, and the other half from pushing on past a threshold (tired, making mistakes but keep going anyway, not feeling well, light is fading [outdoor workshop] etc.)

 

[jttheclockman]

Being in the construction industry as a Union Electrician I have seen my share of accidents. I say accidents because yes safety is the key word in description of an accident. I have had my share. But we are all taught in the trades a safety course. Most jobs there is a safety officer on the job and always looking for violations. We have weekly safety meetings run by the shop steward on the job. These are OSHA rules on a union job. At a safety meeting many topics come up and discussed and then everyone signs a sheet to show you were in attendance. I say these things because when OSHA gets involved with an accident or event on a job, fines can be quite expensive if rules were not followed as expected.

Now to the OP topic in more direct manner, yes choice is usually the case but you can not overlook ignorance especially in a shop. But many times COMMON SENSE is the more correct wording. We may know something is not right and common sense tells us but we choose to ignore and be a hero. So both words work hand in hand. There is so much that can go wrong in a shop(I will stay here because that is what we do). Tools that have sharp blades or knives and spin at high rate of speed can cause an injury in a blink of an eye> You must know how to use your tools. Ignorance is the word that again appears here. Choice is not the proper word here. So when it comes to safety there are many words and knowledge is a key one. Common sense and making the right choices are the others. One other word is focus. Staying focus on the job at hand can be a big deterent for injury. Let the mind wander and bad things happen. All these things can apply to everyday lives especially driving. Accidents do happen and hopefully we all learn from them to never let them happen again. Stay Safe!!!

 

[KenB259]

Being in the construction industry as a Union Electrician I have seen my share of accidents. I say accidents because yes safety is the key word in description of an accident. I have had my share. But we are all taught in the trades a safety course. Most jobs there is a safety officer on the job and always looking for violations. We have weekly safety meetings run by the shop steward on the job. These are OSHA rules on a union job. At a safety meeting many topics come up and discussed and then everyone signs a sheet to show you were in attendance. I say these things because when OSHA gets involved with an accident or event on a job, fines can be quite expensive if rules were not followed as expected.

Now to the OP topic in more direct manner, yes choice is usually the case but you can not overlook ignorance especially in a shop. But many times COMMON SENSE is the more correct wording. We may know something is not right and common sense tells us but we choose to ignore and be a hero. So both words work hand in hand. There is so much that can go wrong in a shop(I will stay here because that is what we do). Tools that have sharp blades or knives and spin at high rate of speed can cause an injury in a blink of an eye> You must know how to use your tools. Ignorance is the word that again appears here. Choice is not the proper word here. So when it comes to safety there are many words and knowledge is a key one. Common sense and making the right choices are the others. One other word is focus. Staying focus on the job at hand can be a big deterent for injury. Let the mind wander and bad things happen. All these things can apply to everyday lives especially driving. Accidents do happen and hopefully we all learn from them to never let them happen again. Stay Safe!!!

Knowledge certainly is key. I was on another site just a few weeks ago where a guy had a video where he was using a miter gauge and the fence on a table saw at the same time. I pointed out that he was asking for a kickback. Well I got flamed and most others were coming to his defense. Again he had no knowledge about what he was doing. I suspect the saw will do a good job educating him.

 

[jttheclockman]

And there lies a huge problem. There are people that think they know all and then there are people who are open minded and you see here at times where someone asks a question and many different answers or approaches are given. It is up to the OP to determine what they think is safe for them. The answers can come from members that have acquired their method and it works for them. They all may be correct and work well. As for the fence and miter gauge, the only way I use both is for a stop block on the fence to set a certain measurement but once the gauge clears the stop block the fence is no longer in play. With a tablesaw there are so many alignments that need to be checked every so often to keep in line and to make the saw safer. But that is a whole other topic.

 

[MTViper]

I spent 30 years in the safety business and compressed all the regulations and standards into 3 simple rules:
1. Don't do anything dumb - this take care of 90% of the problems.
2. It's always quicker, safer, smarter (fill in your own word) to do it RIGHT than to do it over.
3. NEVER under any circumstances underestimate the stupidity of your fellow human being.

I added a 4th when I got a sticker from a metalworking friend of mine:
4. These machines have no brains, use yours!

 

[randyrls]

Cindy Drozda has an expression; "Safety is free, use it to excess!"

Most accidents happen not only from one cause but from a chain of causes.

 

[TDahl]

I definitely agree with all of the posted comments. While I do agree with the fact that using common sense and avoid taking short cuts to save time will help avoid many mishaps in the shop, I believe losing focus on the task at hand is a significant contributor to these incidents. It is very easy to begin thinking about something else (maybe the next step in the process) when you are performing a task you have completed hundreds of times and believe you could do this in your sleep. I also believe fatigue maybe be a contributing factor. Not only are you prone to be sloppy in your work, you are more than likely to rush your work simply to complete the task and in the end putting yourself at risk of injury.

Just some thoughts from past experiences. Very good topic to discuss!

Thanks for the post Ken.

 

[Penchant 4]

When training, and then working as a compliance officer, a key statement was: "Nothing is SAFE." To say that something (action, situation, machine, etc) is safe is to state an absolute. That is to say that under any condition, that something cannot cause injury or damage. The accurate, or more accurate statement is; "X is safer." Safety is relative.

For example, a table saw with riving knife properly installed is not 'safe'. It is safer than a table saw without a riving knife, however.

In any situation, the safer machine can still cause injury or damage if the operator loses focus.

 

[Fine Engineer]

I spent 30 years in the safety business and compressed all the regulations and standards into 3 simple rules:
1. Don't do anything dumb - this take care of 90% of the problems.
2. It's always quicker, safer, smarter (fill in your own word) to do it RIGHT than to do it over.
3. NEVER under any circumstances underestimate the stupidity of your fellow human being.

I added a 4th when I got a sticker from a metalworking friend of mine:
4. These machines have no brains, use yours!

I was made aware of your rule #3 when designing a utility rack with a built in crane for pickup trucks. We had the system designed, and everything worked, then we thought 'how could people misuse this', and it started a 2 month round of adding things to it to keep people from hurting themselves or others. It took as long to design in the safety features as it did to design the initial machine.

 

[Fine Engineer]

When training, and then working as a compliance officer, a key statement was: "Nothing is SAFE." To say that something (action, situation, machine, etc) is safe is to state an absolute. That is to say that under any condition, that something cannot cause injury or damage. The accurate, or more accurate statement is; "X is safer." Safety is relative.

For example, a table saw with riving knife properly installed is not 'safe'. It is safer than a table saw without a riving knife, however.

In any situation, the safer machine can still cause injury or damage if the operator loses focus.

Great points. Any machine connected to any kind of energy source is potentially unsafe. In fact, even not connected to an energy source can be unsafe, as you can trip over it, fall on it, or cut yourself on any sharp edge. So always be careful around any tools!

 

[RunnerVince]

I was made aware of your rule #3 when designing a utility rack with a built in crane for pickup trucks. We had the system designed, and everything worked, then we thought 'how could people misuse this', and it started a 2 month round of adding things to it to keep people from hurting themselves or others. It took as long to design in the safety features as it did to design the initial machine.

"A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the inenuity of complete fools." - Douglas Adams

 

[TellicoTurning]

Safety is knowing or realizing a procedure is dangerous, then not doing it.

 

[sbwertz]

I was part of a group today that was asked this rather unassuming question. Answers ran the gamut such as being aware of your surroundings, knowing the limitation of your tools etc. The best answer, in my opinion, was pretty simple, yet pretty thought provoking. They said more often than not safety is a choice. We make a choice when we decide to move that little cutoff away from a spinning blade or when we decide to clean off a spinning drill bit with our fingernail or other stupid things we might be guilty of. Just food for thought.

Add in blind turners and it is a whole new ballgame. We do ONLY spindle turning at the Blind Center, because of safety concerns. I have had a partially sighted student who bought his own home lathe, and got into bowl turning, but at the center we do only spindle turning. I just wasn't willing to risk having large pieces of wood go flying off the lathe with a blind turner. Wine bottle stoppers are turned on a stopper mandrel, and PSI antique peppermill bases are turned on custom made wooden mandrels. Everything else is turned on a standard 7mm mandrel or between centers.