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Personnel: Safety, Hygiene + Development
News Release from: IChemE (Institution of Chemical Engineers) | Subject: Hazards Conference
Edited by the Processingtalk Editorial
Team on 21 April 2008
Safety expert predicts accidents of the
future
One of the UK's leading process safety experts says that human error is the most likely cause of industrial accidents in the next fifteen years
Professor Trevor Kletz OBE was speaking in Manchester yesterday at the Institution of Chemical Engineers' (IChemE) Hazards conference, where over 300 international safety experts have gathered 85-year-old Kletz who worked for chemical giants, ICI for over forty years as one of the UK's first process safety advisers, said that lessons from the past can highlight the likely problems of the future
This article was originally published on Processingtalk on 2 Nov 2004 at 8.00am (UK)
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"While designs may have changed, people have not.
Do we make fewer mistakes than our parents or grandparents? All errors are human errors.
People have to decide what to do and how to do it.
We must talk to each other about how to prevent accidents.
Discussion is more effective than lecturing.
In meetings, people should learn from incidents of the past and discuss with colleagues whether similar situations could arise in their work.
If so, they must understand what has been done, or should be done, to prevent it," Kletz added.
Kletz was awarded an OBE in 1997 and has written 11 books, over 100 research papers and reports and an autobiography.
He remains a visiting lecturer at Loughborough University in the UK and at Texas A+M University in the US.
During his speech, Kletz also revealed that IChemE is making almost 200 safety newsletters, compiled by Kletz and dating back to the 1960s, available on its website, free of charge.
Kletz was one of over sixty experts to give presentations at this current event, first staged in 1960.
Organised by the IChemE UK north-west branch, the full symposium is available to buy via the IChemE.
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