Human Factors Engineering

Events are caused. Typically, they are triggered by human action. In most cases, the human action causing the event was in error. However, the action could have been directed by a procedure; or it could have been a shortcut to get the job done—a violation. In any case, an act initiates the undesired consequences. On…...

Here we were in 2015, and still, we have far too many businesses still focusing on active failures and ignoring the latent failures impacting their significant incidents.  This approach is the LAZY approach to incident investigation. It also misses the mark on corrective action plans, which almost ensure the organization will not learn from the…...

http://www.hse.gov.uk/humanfactors/topics/complete.pdf… Membership Required You must be a member to access this content.View Membership LevelsAlready a member? Log in here...

As I have said countless times, we ALL make errors.  This means in situations where those errors carry more severe consequences, such as industrial workplaces, then as safety engineers, it is our role to help the business DESIGN SAFE work tasks.  In HF engineering, we have eight (8) system design principles: Accurate mental models Managing…...

The growth of large, complex technology systems in recent decades, such as nuclear power plants, commercial aviation, the petrochemical industry, chemical process plants, and marine and rail transport, has spawned rare but often catastrophic events such as organizational or system accidents. The Three Mile Island nuclear accident, the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the Bhopal India…...

Yes, I am just a sick safety professional who needs help! You may have a point, but I just had to share this “human factors” learning experience from my wife and daughter. First, let me say that there are probably not many women smarter than my wife and 12-year-old daughter. Both women put me to…...

The Herald of Free Enterprise capsized on March 6, 1987, killing ~200 people. It sank because its inner and outer bow doors had been left open on sailing due to a combination of factors and decisions. The subsequent investigation found that all of these could have been avoided or ameliorated. Management failures set up a…...

Several years ago the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) enacted the following regulations in response to some large scale pipeline incidents: § 192.631 Control room management PHMSA published the Control Room Management/Human Factors final rule in the Federal Register on December 3, 2009, which became effective on February 1, 2010.  The agency actually…...

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This is one of those MUST READ studies for all safety professionals who deal with machine gaurding and interlocks, and/or have a behavior based safety process!  Although the study was done on Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machines in the UK, we can certainly see how the results can be expected on ANY machinery and by ANY…...