MANY THANKS to my RENEWING Partners in Safety Since 2013 since 2011 since 2006 2014 Fatality Tracker Electrical 17 (2013 = 32) (2012 = 68) Forklift/Manlift 15 (2013=62) (2012 = 52) Mining* 19 2013=87*) (2012 = 92*) *no longer includes China Explosions 41 (2013=194) (2012 = 241) Cranes 9 (2013=51) (2012 = 52) Falls 41 (2013=106) (2012 = 99) Work Zone 7 (2013=42) (2012 = 62) Trenching 4 (2013=25)...

Since January, I have been puzzled by the reporting from all agencies and media that the explosion shown in the video below involved a fuel oil tank.  I have been intimately involved with fire/explosion investigations for many years. I have never seen a type of fuel oil stored in an atmospheric storage tank under any type of conditions behave like that.  I am very confident that what we are...

This was a joke of a Belgian fire dept, done on a rail track thas was not in use because of maintenance work.  MANY THANKS FF@Tijgernest Hey, this past week our funny photo went viral throughout the whole world. Thousands of shares and likes in many different countries! Once and for all: the picture was taken in Belgium, in a small village called Bornem. After a minor intervention, we had...

My article a couple of weeks ago generated a lot of questions and concerns reagrding Level A suits.  I thought this video would be helpful for those who have never tested or seen a pressure test on a Level A suit.  PLEASE DO NOT consider this a training video that I am providing – it is from Lakeland Industries and should ONLY be applied on their suits.  Although they did a very...

I am IN NO WAY CONDONING this if it were done outside of the Incident Command (as it appears it was) but this is how modern technology could be used to recon these massive scenes WITHOUT putting responders at risk. Of course had there been an H2 car leaking and this drone flew over it, 4th of July would have come early!!!! I am sharing this with those who attend my HAZMAT course and hear my “war...

The final count of fatal work injuries in the United States in 2012 was 4,628, up from the preliminary count of 4,383 reported in August 2013. The final 2012 total was the second-lowest annual total recorded since the fatal injury census was first conducted in 1992. The overall fatal work injury rate for the United States in 2012 was 3.4 fatal injuries per 100,000 full-time equivalent (FTE) workers,...

A janitor was cleaning a washroom located beside a mechanical compressor room. The compressor provided refrigeration to an indoor ice skating rink. The janitor’s body was discovered hours after he failed to check in. The cause of death was found to be a refrigerant (Freon-22) that had leaked from the compressor. Without any warning, the Freon displaced the oxygen in the washroom, and the worker...

We can get the 3rd degree when we start poking around a facility’s safety instrumented systems(s). It seems that there are those who believe they can build a SIS that no human can screw up and oh how wrong they are! Even OSHA was smart enough to require us to consider the consequences of the failure of engineering and administrative controls (1910.119(e)(3)(iv) in our PHA’s. Here is a PERFECT...

Description of Incident:  An operator was checking the level in a 500 gallon methanol storage tank: Tank was polyethylene plastic, double wall A worker climbed on top of the tank. Flammable vapour was ignited, when the worker touched the cap on the inner tank, resulting in an explosion and flash fire.  The worker received first aid for a second degree burn to the arm.  …...