Nowadays, we see a lot of Confined Space (CS) incidents caused by the work that is taking place inside the space rather than the actual process hazards that made the Confined Space a Permit-Required Confined Space (PRCS). I had an incident when I was an S&H Manager in the process chemical industry that was one nobody thought of until it was too late. I want to share this incident with you and demonstrate how workers can create a permit-required confined space (PRCS) by changing the “configuration of the space” and/or by doing work inside the space that creates a PRCS a hazardous atmosphere. Please keep in mind that this facility was trying to enter OSHA’s VPP and had MANY safeguards in place, including all types of work permits. In this incident, the contractors worked under three (3) permits: Contractor Work Permit, Hotwork Permit, and Crane Permit. Here is how it happened…
