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Link between fatigue and accidents


Junior8

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Certainly he hardest page I've ever tried to read. I don't see why the evidence from other industries isn't applied to events. If it was safe for truckers to drive without breaks then the tacho law wouldn't be there. The Israeli defence force decided it was a LOT cheaper to rest their heli pilots than to buy replacement helicopters and train new pilots. But as one work provider said to me "I call them self employed because then the minimum wage and working time regs don't apply" - I don't take work from him! £50 for an 18 hour day!

 

There has already been a corporate prosecution over an incident where a "employee" did a 20 hour shift for several days then killed a few while asleep at the wheel in his private car,

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Then there's Gary Hart of the Great Heck rail crash - convicted of falling asleep at the wheel of his Land Rover which went off road and initiated the multiple train crash that claimed 10 lives.

He'd been on the phone most of the previous night. Unable to admit he was at fault (although he often worked what might be described as excessively long hours) he blamed the vehicle and said others should be accountable for the train crash. He also stated that "stress is character building". He served 30 months of a 5 year term...

 

Sometimes we are just a few centimetres away from a similar outcome...

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I guess it's only a matter of time before someone has an incident of that scale in the ents business and some court and solicitors sort out the weird hours, work provision and work supervising situations in the industry, and some 23 year old "production manager" gets to understand what production management really means while they do time in HM Hotel.
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Fatigue could be seen as akin to exposure. Exposure has significant effect on mental capacity and processes very much like alcohol or drugs. It does not just mean accidents are far more likely but it also affects quality of outcomes. You can't put on the best show possible when it is put together by sleepwalkers.
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You can't put on the best show possible when it is put together by sleepwalkers.

 

The real tricky question, of course, is how this fact can be put across to clients, so that some of the price pressure that leads to stupid hours etc. could be eased.

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In rail industry, ORR and RAIB have developed a fatigue index which looks at a run of shifts, not just the current shift being worked, which they ahve used in bringing H&S prosecutions as well as determining the role of fatigue in an incident. There is talk of a similar system being used in my own 'day job' of medicine to help deal with human factors incidents.

 

I suspect that HSE may use such a tool if they felt an incident was linked to an organisation, or individual's work pattern. I guess self-employed people fit into an interesting category for this, in terms of managing their own work opatterns.

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I appreciate the pressures on costs but they are not a reason to cut corners and stretch things, including human beings, beyond reason.

 

It always strikes me as odd that the biggest players, most reputable companies and safest crews in our game are usually the most expensive yet there are still promoters demanding lower costs while expecting the same quality. Until we get some sort of Fidenae-style licensing of promoters they will always be with us though insurance companies are beginning to do that in an unofficial way in the US.

 

Some years ago I wrote on here, and one or two agreed with me though most did not, that if we cannot afford to do things properly then we cannot afford to do them at all. The current VW ads, climbing rope/parachute/shark cage/laser surgery, make an issue of this and Stella Artois had the "reassuringly expensive" campaign. It works.

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Some years ago I wrote on here, and one or two agreed with me though most did not, that if we cannot afford to do things properly then we cannot afford to do them at all.

Still very much the core of what I teach.

Fatigue isn’t something that can be easily measured or quantified, so it is difficult to ascertain its impact on a worker’s performance after a workplace accident. However, studies have shown that untreated fatigue causes symptoms similar to alcohol impairment, including forgetfulness, errors in judgement, and reduced reaction time. For example:

- Being awake for 17 hours impairs performance to the same level as having a 0.05 blood alcohol content.

- Being awake for 20 hours impairs performance to the same level as having a 0.1 blood alcohol content.

 

When I see unrealistic schedules I often ask if they would allow people to do their work drunk. If the answer is "no" I show them these figures and tell them that's what they will have.

No, it doesn't always work but as with so many safety issues, awareness makes a difference, baby step by baby step.

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Someone I once worked with did an 0700 call, finish at midnight, then drive 3 hours in a van to go home. Probably typical but probably unsound work practise.

 

What was the band (80's four piece 2M +2F) who left Nottingham Royal Centre and failed to get to Newcastle? Deaths and life imparing injuries destroyed the band in a tour coach incident.

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Surely this is about a) knowing your limits and b) respecting people's limits

 

Same applies to lifting stuff - and it is generally respected; nobody wants to see a dropped mac3

It depends on too many factors for anybody else other than the person doing it to judge - you consider strength, recent injuries, tiredness, illness... and the list goes on, so the person judges it.

 

With fatigue, other things apply like commute time, stress, how much you have to do when you get home, how much sleep you normally need, illness...

 

If you had somebody who had worked an 8 hour shift vs somebody who has been working for 17 hours, you would assume that the 17 hours person was more fatigued, but you can't know this, if the 8 hours person was involved in a court case, moving house, or just coming down with a cold, then that would change things. My point being that nobody else other than the person can know how tired they are, and that we should try to replicate what we have with lifting with fatigue.

 

However, it generally isn't treated as such anywhere - maybe it should be.

 

 

 

Just my 2p

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Surely this is about a) knowing your limits...nobody else other than the person can know how tired they are...

 

But, as has been mentioned, fatigue is very much like alcohol consumption and as we get tired we fail to appreciate just how tired we are.

 

We all done it: sit down and close our eyes 'for just a moment' only to wake up some considerable time later.

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We all done it: sit down and close our eyes 'for just a moment' only to wake up some considerable time later.

 

This happend to me after an all day rigging session followed by a, seemingly, all night plotting session. I must have been about 20, fortunately not driving back then. It was a lesson well learnt esp. as I'd sat down on a park bench and came to an hour or two later with the rain dripping off my nose, illuminated by a street light, at around 4am!

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The fact that we all know better and yet it has happened to us all emphasises the point that fatigue is about as harmful to our decision making processes as alcohol.

 

I lectured on it and have still worked myself into zombiedom. Nobody is immune. The sufferer is the last person to judge their own fitness and we all need to care for each other.

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