The Dangers of Human Error

Your Home-Life Affects Your Work-Life

Too often electrical workers neglect necessary safety mitigations because they are lacking proper focus, in a hurry to get home or distracted by events in their personal lives. When we are overly familiar with daily routines, we also greatly underestimate the actual risk involved. Recently a National Field Services technician was a first responder to an accident at a job site that ended up being fatal for the utility worker involved. This tragedy only highlights the need to focus on human performance and its effect on workplace electrical safety. According to the recently added Annex Q of NFPA 70E-2018, human performance is an aspect of risk management that addresses organizational, leader and individual performance as factors that either lead to or prevent errors and their events.

In this video National’s Training and Safety Manager Steve Newton recounts the accident and what went wrong.

Human performance related error is one of the greatest threats electrical workers face. Casualties can happen when people overlook necessary risk management procedures because they believe there will be no consequence. If we fail to follow proper safety regulations and mitigations, we may not get a second chance.

Field Service Engineer Casey Anderson discusses in this video his experience losing a friend and fellow co-worker.

The fact is your home life affects your work life. The old saying about leaving home at home is just not possible. Fatalities and serious injuries caused by human error can be completely avoided, if human performance measures are in place and proper safety procedures are followed. It is essential to assess our personnel’s, our coworkers’, our friends’ and our own ability to complete dangerous tasks with full competency before starting the task. It may save a life.

Return to Fall 2018 Field Notes