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• Lower perceived organizational support linked to more occupational accidents. • Near-miss events also showed similar results to occupational accidents. • Organizations should enhance employees' perceived organizational support. Introduction : Preventing occupational accidents is a major global challenge, and employee safety practices play a crucial role in accident prevention. Although perceived organizational support (POS) is related to safety practices, there is currently insufficient evidence supporting a relationship between POS and occupational accidents. We investigated the relationships between POS and both occupational accidents and near-miss events that can lead to accidents in the following year among workers in various industries in Japan. Method : This prospective cohort study was conducted from March 2022 to March 2023 using a questionnaire survey. In total, 9916 participants who completed the follow-up survey and met our inclusion criteria were analyzed. The follow-up survey asked participants about both occupational accidents and near-miss events experienced in the year following the baseline assessment. POS was evaluated at baseline using the eight-item version of the Survey of Perceived Organizational Support. Odds ratios (ORs) for the relationships between POS and occupational accidents and near-miss events were estimated using multilevel logistic regression analyses nested by industries. Results : The ORs for self-reported occupational accidents were significantly higher for the moderate (OR = 1.41, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.10–1.82), low (OR = 1.49, 95%CI: 1.18–1.89), and very low (OR = 2.03, 95%CI: 1.61–2.56) POS groups compared with the very high group. The ORs for self-reported near-miss events were also significantly higher for the moderate (OR = 1.21, 95%CI: 1.03–1.43), low (OR = 1.20, 95%CI: 1.03–1.40), and very low (OR = 1.56, 95%CI: 1.34–1.82) groups than the very high group. Conclusions : Our findings suggest lower POS is related to a higher occurrence of occupational accidents and near-miss events in the following year. Organizations should consider enhancing employees' POS to reduce occupational accidents and near-miss events. Practical Applications : To enhance employees' POS, organizations should address identified antecedents of POS (e.g., fairness, supervisor support, rewards, favorable job conditions, and human resource practices). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The construction workers are performing manual tasks in harsh conditions. Various environmental risk factors could have significant influence on work fatigue. Methods: This review article discussed the environmental causal factors which involved in work fatigue development in the occupational health perspective, with the aim in enhancing the body of knowledge specifically in the construction industry so that mitigation measures and interventions can be formulated and implemented for fatigue prevention and productivity enhancement. Results: Data derived from a total of 11 relevant articles identified climatic heat, vibration and elevation change as the major risk factors that associated with work fatigue. The mechanism of the environmental factors' influences on muscle, mental and visual fatigue were understood, pointedly the underlying physiological alteration. Additionally, appropriate preventive measures in accordance to the OSHA guides including work-break cycles, work management, cool-down arrangements with drinking water were discussed. The limitation of existing OSH requirements on work limits at heat exposure was recognized, including the lack of consideration on personal characteristics therefore might inaccurately estimate the personal heat tolerance time. Conclusions: The proper understanding of the environmental stressors and its impact on workers production and safety performance may help construction organisations and regulatory body to develop strategies for workers protection and fatigue-related accidents prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/Aim: There is a paucity of evidence on injuries sustained by farriers and hoof care practitioners, two professions exposed to unique occupational hazards. The aim of this study was to collect and examine data on occupational head/face and dental injuries among farriers and hoof care practitioners in a nationwide survey in Switzerland. Materials and Methods: Data on occupational head/face and dental injuries were gathered in a questionnaire‐based, voluntary survey, which was mailed to all farriers and hoof care practitioners in Switzerland. The statistical analysis comprised multiple regressions with a nested design (α = 0.05). Results: The survey included 278 respondents (response rate of 78.1%). Head/face injuries were more frequently reported by farriers than hoof care practitioners (60.6% and 20.7%, respectively). Among full‐time workers, farriers had a higher chance of an occupational head/face injury compared with hoof care practitioners (p =.007). The rate of dental injuries, mainly related to a horse kick, was 11.1% and 1.9% among farriers and hoof care practitioners, respectively. Negligence in wearing mandatory eye protection was reported by 37.5% of respondents. Conclusions: Farriery and hoof care management entail a significant risk of occupational head/face and dental injuries. Preventive safety measures—eye protection in particular—and knowledge in dental first aid should be promoted among farriers and hoof care practitioners to decrease the frequency and severity of work‐related injuries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A fall-from-height accident is considered a major leading cause of construction fatalities. The analysis of accident characteristics could offer effective guidance to the construction industry to prevent falls from heights. By using accident statistical analysis and typical case investigation, this study indicates the basic pattern and reviews in detail the conditions of a fall-from-height incident in China. The result shows that more fatal fall-from-height accidents occur from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. Accidents on weekdays are nearly as many as on weekends. The lowest incidence month is February. Accidents resulting in one death take most of the total. Furthermore, not fastening a safety belt is among the leading reasons workers die after falling from heights. Victims in fall-from-height accidents are mostly male workers. Fall heights are most often less than 15 meters. This study serves to alert construction safety policymakers to diagnose the current state of fallfrom-height accidents and provides a targeted direction for improving the safety record of work at height. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Compared five clustering algorithms. • Used interpretable clustering to analyse truck driver safety climate perception. • Analysed relative importance of safety climate factors to each driver's cluster. • Proposed an improved method to interpret partial dependent plots. The transportation industry, particularly the trucking sector, is prone to workplace accidents and fatalities. Accidents involving large trucks accounted for a considerable percentage of overall traffic fatalities. Recognizing the crucial role of safety climate in accident prevention, researchers have sought to understand its factors and measure its impact within organizations. While existing data-driven safety climate studies have made remarkable progress, clustering employees based on their safety climate perception is innovative and has not been extensively utilized in research. Identifying clusters of drivers based on their safety climate perception allows the organization to profile its workforce and devise more impactful interventions. The lack of utilizing the clustering approach could be due to difficulties interpreting or explaining the factors influencing employees' cluster membership. Moreover, existing safety-related studies did not compare multiple clustering algorithms, resulting in potential bias. To address these problems, this study introduces an interpretable clustering approach for safety climate analysis. This study compares five algorithms for clustering truck drivers based on their safety climate perceptions. It also proposes a novel method for quantitatively evaluating partial dependence plots (QPDP). Then, to better interpret the clustering results, this study introduces different interpretable machine learning measures (Shapley additive explanations, permutation feature importance, and QPDP). The Python code used in this study is available at https://github.com/NUS-DBE/truck-driver-safety-climate. This study explains the clusters based on the importance of different safety climate factors. Drawing on data collected from more than 7,000 American truck drivers, this study significantly contributes to the scientific literature. It highlights the critical role of supervisory care promotion in distinguishing various driver groups. Moreover, it showcases the advantages of employing machine learning techniques, such as cluster analysis, to enrich the scientific knowledge in this field. Future studies could involve experimental methods to assess strategies for enhancing supervisory care promotion, as well as integrating deep learning clustering techniques with safety climate evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Analyzed the cause of secondary explosion accident in Hushan Gold mine in China. • Clarified the direct and indirect causes of the accident. • Calculated and verified the direct cause of the secondary explosion accident. • Put forward the suggestions for preventing secondary explosion accidents in mines. Explosion accidents often occur during mining, especially sudden secondary explosions, which pose a serious threat to the life and property safety of employees. Based on the development process and consequences of typical secondary explosion accidents in Hushan Gold Mine, Qixia City, Shandong Province, China, this paper uses accident analysis model and cone measurement calculation method to determine the direct cause of secondary explosion accidents. The main conclusions are as follows: The HFACS-CM model is used to analyze the causes of secondary explosion from five aspects: external environment, organizational influence, unsafe leadership, the prerequisite conditions of unsafe behavior and unsafe behavior. It is found that the CO ignition explosion in the mining process is the direct cause of secondary explosion. Then, combined with the experimental data of the cone measuring instrument, the field CO amount was calculated, and the M CO ≥ 101.4 m3 was obtained, indicating that the CO production did reach the condition of explosion range, and the analysis results of the model were verified. Through HFACS-CM model analysis and calculation verification, the key causes of secondary explosion accidents in such mines are found and lessons are learned, which provides an effective reference for the effective prevention of deflagration accidents in the field of mine safety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Control banding (CB) strategies offer simplified solutions for controlling worker exposures to constituents found in the workplace. CB is a risk assessment and control process developed by industrial hygienists that is utilized primarily for reducing work-related chemical exposures and has become an important component for identifying and evaluating hazards in laboratories. This process qualitatively generates exposure scenarios according to a "banding" principle. Due to the inherent simplicity of the modern CB approaches, toolkits that address chemical use and exposure reduction with these principles have gained international support. Our question is whether the CB principles might also apply to occupational safety as an accident prevention approach. For safety, probably "barrier banding" (BB) is a better title. Although the development of injury prevention toolkits is a proper goal for BB, some research is necessary before a similar success can be achieved as CB. The excellent efforts of the Workgroup Occupational Risk Model (WORM) research team have generated a number of considerations for BB research. Among these are developing safety exposure limits and time-weighted exposure principles that can be derived for a more aggregated level industry like construction. Optimizing a singular approach for both work-related injury and illness prevention in industry requires a simplified and multidisciplinary strategy utilizing a common risk communication language that CB and BB might provide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Risk identification and risk assessment are the most important issues among the occupational health and safety practices. In the industry, the identification of hazards and the risk assessment are often carried out by using subjective risk assessment methods. These methods usually do not provide a perspective on the nature of the measures to be taken. In order to keep sector-specific risks under control, as important as the assessment of risks is to take effective measures against these risks and to continuously monitor the effectiveness of these measures. Therefore, the main objective of this paper is to classify protective and preventive occupational health and safety measures implemented in the construction sector based on their efficiency by using Fuzzy Kano Model Approach. For this purpose, it is the first time, the feature classes defined by the conventional Kano Model and the Kano Model questionnaire have been reinterpreted in terms of occupational health and safety. Then, the proposed approach has been applied to classify the safety measures utilized in occupational health and safety in terms of their efficiency by using fuzzy Kano Model. According to obtain results, approximately 10% of the control measures which are effectively used at construction site are in Trusting Measure Class. The main contribution of this paper is to provide a new method for analysis of effectiveness of the occupational health and safety measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• An analysis of the industrial accident prevention effect of the hazardous machine safety certification system was performed. • The necessity of the safety certification system was confirmed using three statistical methods. • Surveys, industrial accident data analysis, field surveys, and expert interviews were conducted. • It was confirmed that the safety certification system has a positive effect on industrial accident prevention. • The safety certification system must ensure efficiency by considering the safety policy and industrial environment of each country. The "4th industrial revolution" is accelerating changes in technology, industry, and machinery, and the "Internet of everything" (IoE) requires comprehensive integration of people and machines. Despite the development of these technologies, fatal accidents continue to occur due to malfunctions of dangerous machinery, so the importance of the safety certification system is increasing, but there are few objective analysis data. In this study, the necessity of a safety certification system was confirmed by analyzing the effect of the safety certification system on the prevention effect of industrial accidents in three methods. Based on these analysis results, the industrial accident prevention effect of the current safety certification system and necessary supplementary tasks were derived. Safety certification systems for more than 30 machines and equipment are in operation in South Korea. In this research, the press, crane, catapult, and lift machines most commonly used in industrial fields were analyzed. This study was conducted in five steps: a safety certification system operation status investigation, a survey and interviews, an analysis of dangerous machinery and equipment accidents, focus group interviews, and study of the direction of safety certification systems in consideration of recent IoE developments. As a result of the analysis, various opinions were presented on the safety certification system by subject, and it was found that it was necessary to prepare supplementary measures for the advancement of the safety certification system advancement, expand its field applicability, and improve the efficiency of safety certification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Fatal accidents happen in a workplace with inadequate protective equipment. • Design a deep learning-based classification model for worker safety helmet detection. • Detects whether a hat that does not belong to the PPE is worn to protect the head. • Model is built in two stages to attain high accuracy with small amounts of data. Workplace accidents are on the rise, and the construction and manufacturing sectors account for more than half of all fatalities. In the construction and industrial sectors, most fatal accidents happen in small-scale workplaces with inadequate protective equipment. Wearing personal protective equipment, such as safety helmets, is critical for alleviating these issues. Many methods based on object-detection models have recently been proposed to assess whether safety helmets are worn; however, most of them train existing models to focus only on the wearing or non-wearing of safety helmets and do not determine whether a hat is worn instead of a safety helmet to cover the head. This study split the data into helmet, head, and hat classes, and trained the model to classify employees wearing hats. The model was built in two stages to attain high accuracy with a small amount of training data. The human head was detected in the image using the object-detection model in the first stage. In the second stage, the position of the human head identified in the first step was used to categorize it into three classes using a classification model: helmet, head, and hat. The performances of Faster R-CNN, RetinaNet, and YOLOv5 models were compared. The F1-score of the YOLO-EfficientNet model was 3.2–16.4% higher than those of the other models. The proposed method can help determine whether employees are wearing safety helmets and is expected to assist in the prevention of workplace accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Injuries are a major burden on the Australian healthcare system. Power tool usage is a common cause of accidental injury. A better understanding of the trends of power tool injuries will inform prevention strategies and potentially mitigate costs. Methods: The ED databases from two level 1 hospitals were reviewed for presentations between 2005 and 2015 resulting from accidental injury with power tools. A subgroup of patients presenting to one hospital between 2016 and 2017 were interviewed about the activities and circumstances that led to their injuries, and followed up 3 months later to assess outcomes. Results: A total of 4057 cases of accidental injury from power tool use were identified. Power saws and grinders contributed to 54% of injuries. Most injuries were located on an upper limb (48%) or the head and neck (30%). Over half (54%) of all head injuries were associated with metal and wood fragments to the eye from grinders, drills and saws. Hospital admission rates were highest for patients aged >60 years. Injuries to females were <5% of all presentations, but 40% of those caused by lawnmowers. Among the 200 patients interviewed, lapses in concentration during use, and modification and inappropriate use of a power tool were the main contributors to injury. Recovery periods >3 months were common. Conclusions: Accidental injuries from power tool use have a considerable impact on ED resources and can affect the long‐term quality of life of those injured. Effective education about safe usage and protection may prevent many injuries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Highly valued companies in Corporate Social Responsibility violate social and labour regulations. • There is a need to create real social indicators when measuring corporate social responsibility. • Social aspects in the Global Reporting Initiative seem overrated. • Results in occupational safety and health management audits are lower than in the Global Reporting Initiative. Abstract Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is an increasing demand in companies around the world. We have assessed the degree of CSR in 112 Ecuadorians companies (671 participants), of which 58.9% were multinational, from all sectors and geographical country areas. This was done with the objective of knowing the degree of implementation of occupational safety and health management, and whether there is a correlation between these values and those of CSR. A validated questionnaire was used for the institutional and legitimacy part, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) for the social part, and mandatory audits on occupational health and safety management. An indicator was also added with perceived priorities of social aspects of CSR for the studied population obtained through DELPHI methodology. More than 90% of the studied companies have quality, occupational health and safety, and CSR management systems. 51% of the companies claim to have an adequate system, while only 6.3% of them exceeded the minimum threshold required by Ecuadorian regulations. The women in boards of directors are less than 1% and there are differences between multinational and national companies, as well as in the trading activity of organizations in the institutional context, in legitimacy, and in social aspects. We conclude that the assessment of social aspects with the Global Reporting Initiative seems to be overestimated when compared with the occupational health and safety management system audits or with an indicator created on perceived priorities of CSR social aspects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • A new way to research the work safety is proposed. • The work safety success theory based on the deductive method has been put forward. • The theoretical research of work safety has been deepen. • A dynamic work safety entropy model is constructed and applied. • The conclusion of the paper can be a reference of achieving the zero accident. Abstract Traditional work safety theory has played a significant role in promoting the development of work safety in that its application has effectively reduced the number of accidents and saved thousands of lives. However, as time goes on, the "marginal effect" of the theory is becoming more and more obvious. The world's statistics shows that the number of workplace accidents can only be reduced to a certain level, and cannot be reduced to zero. Also, as reflected from the increasing concerns and research of occupational diseases, the number of new occupational disease case has been found increasing year by year. This paper puts forward the work safety success theory based on the deductive method, which is different from the traditional work safety theory based on the inductive method. It deepens the theoretical research of work safety, and is an important improvement to the traditional theory. Combined with the theory of thermodynamics in physics, the entropy theory is used to explain the work safety success theory. And a dynamic work safety entropy model has been constructed and applied in specific cases, which further validates the work safety success theory. At present, technology and equipment have laid a good foundation for data collection and analysis of work safety research, and the work safety success theory provides a new methodology for the whole process work safety research with big data. The conclusion of this paper can provide reference for achieving the goal of zero accident in the workplace. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Investigation on occurrence of gassy coal extrusion in coalmine is conducted. • The occurrence of gassy coal extrusion is a long and slow development process. • The development process of gassy coal extrusion can be divided into two stages. • Radial support force, gas pressure and stress together determine coal failure. Abstract Although the total death toll due to various accidents in China's coal mining industry has declined in recent years, gas accidents in coalmine, which are usually caused by gas explosions and outbursts, are still threatening miners' lives and property safety. Gassy coal extrusion, as an atypical gas accident, is bearing an increasing occurring frequency, especially in deep coalmine, and causing huge losses of human and property. In order to prevent the occurrence of atypical gas accidents, gassy coal extrusion, and ensure production safety, it is particularly important to investigate the development process of gassy coal extrusion. This study analyzed the changing rules of gas pressure and stress during the development process of gassy coal extrusion through a series of simulation experiments and found that the occurrence of gassy coal extrusion was a long and slow development process from shallow to deep. The development process can be divided into rapid stripping stage and slow fracturing stage; during the rapid stripping stage, the coal is stripped and broken into fragments due to rapid decrease of gas pressure and stress; during the slow fracturing stage, the coal fractures slowly and forms an arc-layered fracture resulting from slow release of gas pressure and stress transferring. Coal failure during the process of coal extrusion is determined by the gradual unloading of radial support force in the direction of extrusion, releasing of gas pressure and transferring of stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Graphical abstract Highlights • Preventive enforcement based on learning from accident investigation and analysis help in accident reduction. • 'Fall from height' causes maximum fatality in Indian conditions. • Harsh weather conditions increase accident occurrence. • Steel industries are relatively more accident prone. • Top management leadership, peoples participation and employee accountability, prioritizing safety in day to day production activities are crucial for Vision Zero goals. Abstract Despite best efforts to minimize risk in organizations, accidents appear almost unavoidable due to various reasons. In India and other parts of the world industrial accidents are investigated to know the causes so that recurrence can be minimized by designing adequate preventive measures. However, findings of investigation are seldom used appropriately to strengthen Occupational Safety and Health (OSH). The mineral rich state of Odisha (India), known as a hub for Iron & Steel industries, witnessed frequent accidents during 2005–2009. This article based on study of 982 fatal 'factory-accidents' occurred during 2001–2016, discusses the 'turnaround-story' resulting in reduction of fatal accident from 122 in 2009 to 45 in 2016. The paper examines the type of accidents, industries and distribution of the year; role of climate and harsh weather conditions on accident causation; impact of regulatory interventions in reducing accidents. Software such as R, SQL, MS-Excel and Tableau were used for analysis of data. It is found that maximum fatality is caused due to 'fall from height' (24%) and the harsh weather conditions of summer increase chances of accidents. Further, the study suggests that enforcement of partial work-restriction around lunch time during peak summer and screening and training of employees tend to reduce accidents due to fall from height. The study indicates that preventive enforcement based on learning from experience can be considered as an effective method to improve occupational safety and minimize employment injury in the journey towards 'Vision Zero' goal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on Mike Coe, safety and medical manager at car factory Honda of Canada Manufacturing, who encourages safety leaders to report issues causing industrial safety. Topics discussed include necessity to focus on efforts to prevent injuries and raise stature of safety, characteristics of rockstar according to song "What Makes a Rock Star?" by Debra Wright and need of safety rockstar to help people feel better.

Information quality deficiencies have been detected in occupational safety and health surveys in Europe, which typically gather self-reported data responded by employers or their representatives. For instance, their low response rates and informant profiles make estimations on establishments with safety representatives (SRs) unreliable. We tested the mode of administration and informants as sources of error regarding establishments with SRs in Catalonia, Spain. Two sources of information were compared: the Second Catalan Survey of Working Conditions 2011 (IICSWC)—with a methodology similar to surveys conducted at the state and European level—and the Progam on Prevention of Risks Management in Companies (PPRMC)—in which the labor authority collected data using a documentary verification in another sample of establishments. Percentage of establishments with SRs was estimated using the data from the PPRMC and also the differences in percentage between sources and informant profiles (with 95 percent confidence interval). Results show that the IICSWC overestimates the percentage of establishments with SRs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research aimed to develop a method to facilitate the implementation of prevention through design and apply it to a pump station case study in Manitoba, Canada. The method used, in part, failure mode and effects analysis and involved tasking experts with analyzing the project's design documents to identify potential occupational health and safety failures that could occur throughout construction. It also entailed analyzing the project's construction documents to determine actual, design-related, occupational health and safety failures observed throughout construction. The application of the method to that project identified 42 potential failure modes in the design, 38% of which were deemed high-risk. A total of 18 failures were detected throughout construction. Of these, 89% were predicted using failure mode and effects analysis and thus deemed preventable by design, indicating the potential effectiveness of the method. Future research should reapply it to other projects to validate these findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rate of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), hepatitis B virus (HBV), and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections among health care workers that is caused by sharps injuries is higher in the Caribbean and Latin America than in other regions of the world. To respond to and reduce occupational exposures to bloodborne pathogens while also strengthening capacities in the Caribbean, needlestick injury prevention training programs for health care workers were implemented, beginning in 2011. The programs included lectures, workshops, policy reviews, evaluations of safety devices, and workplace assessment. During the training, baseline data from health care workers on their personal history of needlestick injuries and bloodborne pathogen exposure was collected. That baseline data showed that 40% of the participants had sustained sharps injuries during their professional career. In this capacity-building effort, 210 health care workers from five countries have been trained, six health care centers in the Caribbean have been evaluated. and occupational safety and health committees have been established in various countries to monitor and improve safety policies and practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the importance of leading ergonomic safety performance indicators (SPIs) in workplaces to evaluate the effectiveness of ergonomic management control programs (EMCP). In the absence of increased implementation of recommended SPIs within global occupational health and safety management systems (OHSMS), efforts for improved workplace safety may not pay off.

The article discusses how industrial accidents can be investigated and analyzed to correct management system deficiencies. The basic objective of investigating and analyzing incidents is to understand how and why an incident occurred so that similar incidents can be prevented in the future. Corrective actions can be determined on the basis of this analysis and management systems can be improved based on that.

The article discusses the integration of behavior-based safety (BBS) and human and organizational performance (HOP) in various settings to improve industrial safety performance. Those organizations, which are currently using BBS, need to educate their workforce on key HOP principles. BBS focuses on employees following proper steps and procedures to stay safe. However, BBS emphasizes on the need for people to make proper choices to behave safely.

The article offers information on inspecting and testing anchorages for workers at heights. The U.S. Occupational Safety & Health Administration's (OSHA) updated walking and working surface regulation focuses on the importance of anchorages that are used in support of window cleaning and facade maintenance equipment, and for fall protection. OSHA requires that all components of an anchorage have a design strength that exceeds or equals their required strength.

Although, there are a number of safety management systems available but the near-misses, dangerous occurrences, incident and accidents occur every day and it became worst and known to be a major concerned in mining industry. In this paper, a coal mine accident has been analysed which showed reoccurring disturbances during routine operation were present in the contributory path of the accident. The reoccurring disturbances were the warning from the system toward the organisation and could be seen as pre-warning signals. It is necessary to investigate all the pre-warning which are unknown, as well as to identify all the underlying causes. As a result suitable action can be taken against them for the prevention of accidents in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the maintenance of an injury-free workplace and the requirement of the cultural transformation to an interdependency state from dependency and independency state. It also discusses the importance on the part of the workers to rely on their employer in the efforts of the later to keep the former safe through the implementation of safety rules and engineering technology.

Chemical and petrochemical accidents, such as fires and explosions, do not happen frequently but have considerable consequences. These accidents compromise not only human safety but also cause significant economic losses and environmental contamination. The increasing complexity of chemical infrastructures increases the requirements of risk prevention. Thus, risk analysis for petrochemical systems is essential in helping analysts find the weakest process in the entire system and be used to strengthen the process and improve safety. Risk analysis has been previously studied; however, traditional methods have limitations. This study proposes a methodology that is based on Bayesian networks by giving a model for system risk analysis. The event is classified into three categories; cause, incident, and accident, according to criticality and thus, the model is analyzed as a three-layered structure. The application of the methodology is demonstrated by analyzing a vacuum distillation and an atmospheric unit. An exact reasoning method is used to infer the causality and probability within the events. After inferring the relationship between causes and accidents, mutual information and variance of beliefs are calculated to find the most sensitive event in an accident. Subsequently, means of strengthening operations to prevent accidents are suggested. This study may help companies decrease the cost of risk reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Facility siting and layout configuration are essential factors during design and expansion of any industrial installation. In the recent past, cost-driven layout arrangements and the proximity of chemical facilities to densely populated areas, among other factors, have also contributed to the severity and propagation of various chemical incidents. Although several studies have been reported to address such problems, there is still a need for incorporating safety into the facility layout problem (FLP); especially for a method combining quantitative risk assessment (QRA) and layout reformulation. Based on that, the objective of this study is to develop a framework integrating layout formulation with a quantitative risk assessment method to support risk-based decisions throughout the lifecycle of process facilities. The proposed methodology is divided into three steps: risk calculation, determination of safety distances, and layout optimisation. In the first stage, an in-house code has been developed to quantify risks associated with loss of human life and structural damage stochastically. Subsequently, minimum separation distances between process units are obtained to prevent escalation events. In the last stage, risk maps and safety distances are accounted in a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) for layout optimisation. The application of the proposed methodology is demonstrated through a case study. Sensitivity analysis is performed by varying risk values, safe distances, and risk acceptance criteria. Even though different layout options are generated, a trend is observed towards placing the equipment by its type. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An important feature of the industrial non-routine operation processes is the time sequence constraint among its steps. Therefore, the main hazard source could be the risk originating from the out-of-sequence scenarios. The traditional job safety analysis (JSA) method does not take account of time sequence constraint and should be adapted to address this problem. A graphical model based on Petri net is defined and further integrated into JSA. A non-routine operation process can be divided into steps according to JSA and then be represented as the basic unit of the revised Petri net. Through the graphical model, abnormal time sequence scenarios and their corresponding abnormal events can be identified. The united method can address time sequence and provide an intuitive and logical risk assessment procedures. The results can also provide effective guidance for workers and supervisors in the non-routine operations process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has been experiencing dynamic industrialization because of rapid economic growth. Even with steady industrial safety improvements in recent years in China, the death rate per accident is increasing, and major accidents (MAs) as well as particularly serious accidents (PSAs) are still occurring every year. Evidently, the risk of industrial accidents, especially of MAs and PSAs is still high. Moreover, China has entered a bottleneck period for the prevention and control of MAs and PSAs. In a word, MAs and PSAs have become a significant challenge for China’s industrial, social, and economic development. In recent years, especially since 2016, great attention of the Chinese government has been given to the prevention and control of MAs and PSAs. China launched its nationwide safety campaigns for firmly curbing MAs and PSAs. Some potentially effective measures and strategies in a series of safety policy documents (e.g., the ‘Guidelines for Comprehensively and Resolutely Curbing MAs and PSAs’ and the ‘Thirteenth-Five-Year Plan for Work Safety’) were also proposed, to reduce MAs and PSAs. Firstly, this paper makes a statistical analysis of China’s MAs and PSAs between the year of 2002 and 2016 to figure out the current status of MAs and PSAs in China. Then this article reviews some latest major events of the prevention and control of MAs and PSAs in China to introduce the recent efforts in the prevention and control of MAs and PSAs in China. Finally, according to a series of safety policy documents in China, and the scientific research literature from other countries, this study gives a brief introduction to the future prospects of the prevention and control of MAs and PSAs in China. Obviously, this study can provide useful evidence and suggestions for the future prevention and control of MAs and PSAs both within China and in other countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Occupational accidents are commonly collected in large databases by National Workers Compensation Authorities and companies’ safety and prevention teams. The analysis of the data can be difficult because the database elements are characterized by many parameters, which are not of a numerical nature. Data mining techniques could represent an efficient tool for the identification of useful information in large databases. In 2011, a two-level clustering method, made of SOM and numerical clustering, obtained positive results in identifying critical accident dynamics. The present research proceeds from that initial methodology. A sensitivity analysis of the coupled clustering method was carried out. Some improvements have been designed, and an enhanced methodology has been applied to the original case study data set, for validation purposes. This method represents an efficient tool for the analyst that has to deal with the occupational accidents data, thanks to its capability of grouping and visualizing data in a readable and exportable outcome. The information acquired by this method can help analysts to better address the measures to be adopted in a work environment, in order to prevent occupational accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports that contractor pre-qualification is a pre-tender process used to examine and assess the capabilities of contractors to carry out a contract satisfactorily if it is awarded to them. It notes that a present-day answering of Petersen's questions in the context of contractor prequalification is aided by the observations of Philips and Waitzman.

Discusses investigations into how the U.S. Energy Department handles safety for its workers. Dept. of Energy submission of magnetic tapes to Dr. Alice Stewart, its chief critic; Reforms recommended by Energy Secretary James Watkins; Details of health dangers to nuclear workers; Policies; Role of Thomas Mancuso as workplace hygienist who examined conditions at Hanford.

• The present study has made significant additions to the existing knowledge of literatures related to the occurrence of human-related errors by identifying 140 contributing errors behind the occurrence of three major issues such as lack of supply & usage of PPE, improper safety training, poor safety supervision at the level of Top Management (TM), Safety Supervisors (SS) & Workers(W) through in-depth focus interview. The findings of this study will enable the top management, Safety supervisors & workers of the construction organizations to get to know about the errors that occur at their levels. Through this, they can contribute to the prevention of accidents by avoiding such issues at their levels while implementing safety practices such as the supply & usage of PPEs, Safety Training and Safety Supervision. The safety performance of the Indian construction industry is not satisfactory, due to which many accidents are still prevailing in the construction industry. To execute the project successfully without any accidents all the levels of employees must be consciously involved in preventing accidents without committing errors at their individual level. Many researchers have conducted studies to find out the major issues that lead to causes of accidents at single employee level. Finding out major issues at single employee level alone may not be sufficient to prevent accidents, because construction is not a domain of a single category of employees; instead, it is a field of several categories of employees working at various levels in the execution of the projects. Any single error committed at any of the employee level may contribute to major issues that would leads to accidents. Therefore, in order to identify the potential errors that occur at multi-level employees, the present study has adopted three-dimensional view strategy to investigate human related errors that occur during the implementation of each stage of safety practices such as supply & usage of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), Safety training (ST) and Safety supervision (SSV) from Top management (TM), Safety supervisors (SS) and workers (W) perspectives. This study has identified three major issues such as lack of supply & usage of PPE, improper safety training, poor safety supervision and 140 contributing errors (responses) behind the occurrence of these three major issues through focus interviews carried out at construction organizations based in Chennai city, South India. Out of identified 140 contributing errors, 45 contributing errors were behind the occurrence of lack of supply & usage of PPE (TM level −26 errors; SS level-13 errors; W level −6 errors), 32 contributing errors were behind the occurrence of improper safety training (TM level-18 errors; SS-12 errors; W level-2 errors) and 63 contributing errors were behind the occurrence of poor safety supervision (TM level-32 errors; SS level −21 errors; W level −10 errors). The results obtained are explained figuratively by comparing it with the results of similar previous studies. The study results shows that any major issue that lead to cause of accidents possibly cannot occur alone, but would occur as a result of several contributing errors from various levels of employees. The findings of the study may be helpful for the construction organizations to prevent accidents in future by avoiding the identified contributing errors at the levels of TM, SS, and W. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Monitoring workers' safety compliance is critical to the construction accident prevention. However, current practices mainly rely on the safety mangers' manual observation. To improve safety management, this study examines the feasibility of the automated framework to classify pre-defined safety behaviors of scaffolding workers and identify whether each safety behavior was carried out. To examine the fidelity of the framework, 35 scaffold workers were studied by using five inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensors and implementing the five safety regulations. To classify compliance with safety regulations, this study builds on the Gramian angular fields (GAFs) based convolution neural network (CNN). The proposed model is compared to five other classification algorithms. The performance evaluation results show that the proposed method is feasible to identify whether workers comply with safety regulations automatically. This outcome has the potential to improve safety management through personalized worker training or notification during work. • GAF-CNN based algorithm is applied to identify safety regulation compliance of workers. • Six learning algorithms are compared to validate feasibility of framework. • Classification and identification performance results of safety compliance are presented. • The proposed framework with GAF-CNN achieves 94.97% on activity classification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In January 2015, the FAA released a congressionally mandated, final rule on Safety Management Systems (SMS) for Part 121 air carriers. Since organizations must implement SMS, often at considerable expense, a sound, valid means of measuring SMS effectiveness must be established. The purpose of this research was to develop a model to measure and test SMS effectiveness. It was constructed through a systematic series of steps, ensuring accomplishment of research objectives. While preliminary, this research demonstrates that Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) models can be produced to help organizations measure the effectiveness of their SMS and determine how to improve SMS-related performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Civil construction sites are considered as one of the riskiest environments where many potential hazards may occur. To protect construction workers and prevent accidents in such sites, this paper proposes a novel design for an autonomous system that monitors, localizes, and warns site laborers who avail within danger zones. The proposed system is user-friendly, and its architecture is based on Internet of Things (IoT). The heterogeneous components of this architecture are seamlessly integrated into a middleware backend online server. To accurately detect and identify construction workers, the proposed system employs three combined techniques. They are 1) the 868 MHz radio frequency, 2) directional antennas, and 3) the 40 kHz ultrasound waves. Vehicle's rear is secured by a sensing unit that ensures good coverage along with a wearable device for workers. The design of the wearable device includes a set of components which are a radio transceiver (transmitter/receiver), a wake-up sensor, an alarm actuator, and a GPRS module. The wearable device has a power saving scheme with a current consumption as low as 0.5 μA at 3 V supply; thanks to our RF wake-up sensor. Via proximity, this wearable device becomes hybrid (active/passive) in which it remains in deep sleep mode until the presence of a radio frequency (RF) field. Consequently, the rechargeable battery's life gets increased by up to 2 days of autonomy before recharging. Furthermore, the paper presents an implementation of wireless nodes that are powered by light energy using photovoltaic cells. These nodes adopt energy management and storage schemes for continuous operation for indoor and outdoor environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Risk assessment is the first step towards safer and healthier jobs, and it is the way to reduce accidents at work and occupational diseases. Taking into consideration the need for good management of the risks of accident and professional disease at the unit level and the new legal requirements, the evaluation of the risk factors for injury and professional illness at the -- blast-furnace worker-from C. S. ArcelorMittal Galati taken into consideration for this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the principles and techniques that can be used to strengthen the foundation of a business' common understanding of safety. Topics mentioned include the types of control used to reduce hazard exposure, the consistency by which the business determines safe and unsafe, and the business value of hazards.

Near misses in which safety plays a critical role are significant to organizations. However, how people in safety-critical organizations can learn from near misses and in the future avoid the associated negative consequences still remains unresolved. Drawing on goal orientation theory, we explored how individuals' goal orientation influences their response in a near-miss situation, mediated by counterfactual thinking. We conducted a field study with 141 construction workers and car-accessory-manufacturing workers in China. The results indicated that upward counterfactual thinking mediated the positive relationship between learning goal orientation and safety participation, whereas downward counterfactual thinking mediated the negative relationship between performance goal orientation and safety participation. The findings together highlight the significance of goal orientation and counterfactual thinking in influencing people's safety behavior in the workplace. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human factors are the primary factors leading to accidents. Therefore, managing human factors is an important way to prevent accidents. This paper aims to introduce a new method to assess and manage human factors. First, the accident causation model was improved based on Reason's "Swiss-cheese" model, which was then combined w ith the Human Factor Analysis and Classification System (HFACS) to establish the human factors risk assessment model. The evaluation model includes 5 levels (organization influence, unsafe supervision, preconditions for unsafe acts, unsafe acts and emergency influence) and 25 human factors. In the risk assessment process, the set pair analysis method was used to calculate the connection number and the partial connection number of each factor, level and whole system. The safety score and risk development interval were calculated by using the connection number and the risk grade is determined. Thus, the dynamic quantitative evaluation of human risk is realized. By using the partial connection number, the risk development trend of each factor is predicted. Due to the lack of human managed enterprises, the safety status of people is approximately discrete. Therefore, this paper establishes the SPA-Markov chain risk prediction model to predict human risk. The verification results show th a t the prediction error is less than 2%. This indicates that the prediction model can be applied in practice. To reduce human risk, ABC analysis and the "S-O-R" model were used for human risk management. The application results show that this method has a significant effect on improving human safety factors. Finally, this paper summarizes 12 common unsafe factors and their effective safety "stimulus" measure, researching the accident path. According to the organizational level and individual level of human factors, different kinds of human factors management methods are suggested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, we extend a previously introduced framework for safety supervisory control with the ingredient of Temporal Logic (TL) to improve both accident prevention and dynamic risk assessment. We examine the synergies obtained from integrating model-based hazard modeling/monitoring with the verification of safety properties expressed in TL. This expanded framework leverages tools and ideas from Control Theory and Computer Science, and is meant to guide safety intervention both on-line and off-line, either during the design stages or during operation to support operator's situational awareness and decision-making in the face of emerging hazardous situations. We illustrate these capabilities and the insight that results from the integration of the proposed ingredients through a detailed case study. The study involves a runway overrun by a business jet, and it shows how hardware, software, and operators’ control actions and responses can be integrated within the proposed framework. The aircraft suffered from a faulty logic in the Full Authority Digital Engine Computer (FADEC), which prevented the pilot from activating the thrust reversers in a particular operational scenario. We examine the accident sequence against three system safety principles expressed in TL: the fail-safe principle, the defense-in-depth principle, and the observability-in-depth principle. The framework is implemented in Simulink and Stateflow, and is shown to provide important feedback for dynamic risk assessment and accident prevention. When applied on-line, it provides warning signs to support the sensemaking of emerging hazardous situations, and identifying adverse conditions that are closer to being released. When applied off-line, it provides diagnostic information regarding missing or inadequate safety features embedded in the system. For the specific case study, we propose a new TL safety constraint (based on speed measurements and the history of pressure sensors from the landing gears) to be incorporated in this and other aircraft FADEC, and that could have prevented the hazardous situation, in this case a rejected takeoff following tire explosion, from turning into a deadly accident. We conclude with some recommendations to prevent similar accident recurrences and to improve accident prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subject of this work is the risk assessment, concentrating on the constructions' workplaces of EU countries. Two significant methodologies (adapted from the scientific litterature), as well as a combined elaboration (joint analysis) of their results, are used for this purpose. The first one, is the Proportional Risk Assessment Technique (PRAT) (see [1], [2], [3] ) and the second one, is the analysis of Time Series Processes (TSP) (see [4], [5] ), concerning occupational accidents. In particular, real data of occupational accidents in Greece, Cyprus, France, Germany and Spain, are analyzed (PRATTSP joint analysis). These data have been collected from different official State sources or databases, throughout various time intervals, namely: (i) for Greece by "SEPE" (Labor Inspectorate, Ministry of Employment) regarding the years 2001-2011 (ii) for Cyprus by the "Department of Labor Inspection of Cyprus" (DLIC) concerning the years 2003-2011 and (iii) for the countries Greece, France, Germany and Spain from the "Eurostat" database covering the period 1996- 2007. The relevant results, show that the estimated value for the magnitude of risk (R) in the worksites of the constructions sector (Constructions and Public Works) is, in some cases, greater than 200, that proves, according to the scientific litterature, the necessity of taking measures no later than one year, in order to downgrade the direct risk of arising fatal accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]