I am betting most everyone has heard the old phrase, “that’s an accident waiting to happen.” My brother (also a safety engineer) and I have pondered whether our father, who used that phrase often, influenced our career choices more than we had ever imagined. But how many safety professionals understand what this phrase is saying?
This phrase centers around the principle of “Latent failures.” Dr. James Reason best explains latent failure…
Latent conditions possess two important properties: first, their effects are usually longer lasting than those created by active failures; and, second, they are present within the system before an adverse event and can – in theory, at least – be detected and repaired before they cause harm. As such, they represent a suitable target for safety management. But prior detection is not easy because it is very difficult to foresee all the subtle ways latent conditions can combine to produce an accident.
But when we say, “that’s an accident waiting to happen,” we are simply recognizing those latent failures we are capable of seeing/hearing. Our challenge in the safety profession is educating others to see (and hear) risks through our eyes and ears so they too can recognize the latent failures AND address them BEFORE they combine with ACTIVE failures leading to an undesired consequence.