Are you meeting your machine safety WHS obligations?

Work-related injury, illness and fatality costs Australia almost $62 billion per annum — around 4.1% of GDP — according to Safe Work Australia. The most recent SWA report draws on statistics from 2013–14 and found that injury alone accounted for 45% (or $28 billion) of that total.

To better ascertain cost implications, SWA conducted an analysis of data and determined that the average cost per injury exceeds $75,000. While the overall number of serious workers compensation claims has been steadily decreasing since 2005, the median time lost in weeks has increased, as has the median compensatory payout.

Given the significant financial, societal and human cost, combined with more stringent workplace health and safety legislation, it’s difficult to understand why avoidable injury occurs at all.

Man and machine

Often at the more serious end of the scale, workplace accidents involving machinery can have a devastating and long-lasting impact. Thankfully, current data shows a consistent decline in the number of serious workers claims for ‘being trapped by moving machinery or equipment’ — from 2145 in the 2000–01 financial year to 1065 in 2014–15. In terms of fatalities, that same downward trend applies.

This pattern of improvement can be attributed to:

• better machine design and the increased presence of engineering controls
• increased promotion of workplace safety culture
• training
• provision of appropriate personal protective equipment (PPE).

Yet, with all these mechanisms in place, over 1000 individuals each year still suffer debilitating — and avoidable — injury when working with machines. So, what’s going wrong? A couple of recent examples may shed some light.

Case 1: Serious hand injury caused by machine guard problem

In September 2017, Southern Cross Magistrates Court found that Cooperative Bulk Handling Ltd (CBH) had failed to provide a safe work environment, causing serious harm to an employee. In 2014, a worker was helping move a stacker/loader connected to a tripper on a conveyor. Though the tripper wheel had a guard fitted, it was found to be both upside down and installed on the wrong side. When the stacker/loader moved, the worker’s hand fell onto the rail and was run over by the tripper wheel. Extensive hand injuries required three surgeries and eventual amputation of the little finger.

CBH was aware of the guard problem prior to the incident and failed to rectify. The company was fined $37,500 for its inaction, which regrettably also caused irreparable harm to an employee.

Case 2: Worker fractures arm caught in machine

In November 2015, a WorkSafe investigation found that Turi Foods Pty Ltd had also failed its WHS obligations. An employee was injured at a processing plant when her hand became caught in machinery, causing fractures to her right arm, along with significant skin and finger damage. The enquiry found several issues had contributed: 1) a lack of machine guarding permitted access to rotating parts; 2) a warning sticker above the machine was damaged and illegible; and 3) the worker had not been shown how to shut down the machine. Turi was fined $60,000 plus an additional $4000 court costs — when installation of a $400 mesh guard could have prevented the incident entirely.

Compliance is more than ‘set and forget’

The Turi case is particularly troubling as it shows compliance failure on multiple levels, but both highlight why WHS compliance requires more than a ‘set-and-forget’ mentality.

Gavin Grech, CEO of industrial automation provider Control Logic, said one of the fundamental problems is that risk assessments are carried out as a one-off exercise.

“This is quite common. We’ll see companies conduct a risk assessment and not consider that reassessment over time is an integral part of the process. There needs to be more focus on change and the subsequent implications. Changes should be recorded and assessed in isolation but, more importantly, assessed within the bigger picture. Otherwise you’ll fail to identify the flow-on effect and the additional hazards those changes can create,” Grech said.

Serg Ivkovic is a Safety Services Engineer at safe automation services supplier Pilz Australia. He said risk assessment and control measure implementation is too often just a box-ticking exercise.

“It’s not just a matter of putting a control measure in place — that’s not meeting your obligations. You need to check how those measures are implemented — are they suitable for the environment and really reducing risk? Ignoring this is how safety control measures (like guarding) can be fitted incorrectly, go unnoticed and lead to a preventable accident. Ensuring the measures employed are appropriate is the key.

“Understanding that the suitability of a control measure will almost certainly change over time is an additional consideration. You need to continually monitor and review,” Ivkovic said.

Technology or philosophy?

Technology developments, engineering controls and machine design improvements may have facilitated a safer environment, but Grech said a change of philosophy has been the biggest contributor.

“In the early days of machine safety, the mentality was ‘let’s put a guard around everything and no-one can get hurt’. This was problematic because it usually ignored a fundamental requirement — operators need to interact with machines,” he said.

Ivkovic echoed this and said though technological advances have provided a more diverse range of risk-reduction measures, success is still underpinned by a complete situational understanding.

“Understanding the machine/human interaction is crucial when selecting the appropriate measures, which brings us back to risk assessment. Some businesses fail to consider that interaction, or will conduct an assessment without input from affected workers — this means not only operators, but also maintenance and engineering staff. These are often outsourced functions, but that shouldn’t preclude involvement of those parties,” Ivkovic said.

“The philosophy now is to look at the tasks required and to create a function that enables interaction with minimised safety risk. Advances in diagnostics have also helped — if something does go wrong, information needs to be conveyed quickly so appropriate evasive action can be taken. By offering increased visibility and greater overall control, we’re enabling operators to carry out required tasks in a safer manner,” Grech said.

The dangers of complacency

Of course, that ability to respond quickly depends on adequate training in the safe operation of machines — another area where complacency can set in.

“Adequate training is obviously imperative for new staff, but there are additional issues,” Grech said.

“We see instances of incorrect operation, but an equal problem is complacency. You’ll see someone who’s been successfully operating a machine for years and they’ve almost forgotten the dangers involved. Training needs to consider this aspect as well.

“You can’t assume that because something hasn’t happened it never will. Many times, I’ve heard the argument ‘we’ve had this machine for years and no-one has ever been hurt, so it must be safe’. This isn’t the right philosophy,” he said.

In Ivkovic’s experience, the process for upgrading or purchasing new machinery can be inherently flawed, leading to safety issues at a later stage.

“If the parties involved in a purchase aren’t familiar with all the steps, there’s potential for problems down the track.

“This is changing, and we are increasingly seeing a trend toward the development of an internal standard to ensure a new machine meets identified criteria. This is backed by factory acceptance testing and validations once the machine is installed to ensure it meets those theoretical checks. Only then will it be released into production, which can help avoid safety issues at a later stage,” Ivkovic said.

Revisit, review, revise

While safety standards improve and the likelihood of serious injury when working with machines decreases, the highlighted cases illustrate how a simple oversight or lack of action can have a devastating effect — safety and operations managers cannot afford to demonstrate an ethos of ‘if it hasn’t happened yet, it probably won’t happen’.

There is no status quo for WHS or employer obligation and safety is more than a checklist of duties. Workplaces and tasks change every day so risk assessment, policy development and training must evolve accordingly — the stakes are simply too high to think otherwise.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/NinaMalyna