Have you every walked up on a hotwork job and asked who is the fire watch, only to have five welders not even look up and point to each other? It happens, but there is a simple way to correct this behavioral problem - High Visibility Vests.

9.5.2 The total aggregate volume of Class I, II, and IIIA flammable liquids in a group of storage cabinets shall NOT exceed the MAXIMUM ALLOWABLE QUANTITY (MAQ) of flammable and combustible liquids per control area based on the occupancy where the cabinets are located.

Industrial Scientific Corporation has determined that the GasBadge^® Plus single-gas instrument may not properly indicate a low battery condition resulting in a failure to alarm or instrument shut down.  This condition is worsened when the instrument is used in conditions below room temperature.  As a result, for safety reasons, Industrial Scientific is issuing a recall of all current GasBadge Plus instruments (v2.2 and earlier; manufactured prior to February 2012). For more information, visit www.indsci.com/gbplusrecall. Click Here to download the Official Recall Notice (pdf), Click Here to download the Recall FAQs (pdf), Click Here to download the Customer Recall Form (pdf)

Click Here (pdf)  This alert was posted to my linked in profile in 2010 and I forgot about.

This happened in Regina, Tuesday morning (29 November 2011). Here is what the owner said:

Anyone involved with PSM/RMP knows about "facility siting" and all the attention it has gotten since the Texas City, TX incident in 2005.  Many companies struggle with this type of analysis, so I am passing along some great data that could be used during an expansion project at an existing facility or for a new facility.  PLEASE note that even if your process does NOT fall under PSM or RMP, this data should still be used as many states use NFPA 30 (or some version) as their flammable liquid code.

Ordinary glass containers exposed to heat will fail at about 212F (100C) due to thermally induced stress. Storage cabinets are designed to offer protection from radiant heat, but only for a limited time of intense fire exposure. These limitation MUST be recognized by the user.

A contractor was wearing a cotton flame resistant garment (FRC). According to testing done by the Newtown Square Research Center and the clothing manufacturer, these fabrics can exothermically react with bleach solutions to produce enough heat to burn skin and give off toxic gases (see box in alert). Nomex flame resistant garments do NOT react similarly.  The manufacturer of the cotton FRC in this incident, Westex, cautions against the use of Bleach and Hydrogen Peroxide in their laundry guide but they do not communicate the potential for heat generation when these products are used.

One of the most common questions I used to get on emergency response scenes is "how do you determine when we can stop wearing SCBAs and begin wearing Air Purifying Respirators".  The decision is often a heated debate, due to the users lack of knowledge.  The scary part, these are trained HAZMAT Technicians who should know better.  But a quick survey of some clients and SAFTENG members I found there are a lot of folks out there who may not fully understand the decision logic behind the type of respiratory protection is needed.  So here we go... UPDATED on 2/3/12

I am not positive that this is a legit list, as there is NOTHING new on this org's website since 2009!  But all the incidents are legit as I covered them in the Incident Alerts.  Not sure who or what org put this together, but it it relevant info for safety discussions.  From agriculture to mining to health care, the occupational fatalities that made the 2011 top ten list compiled by the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health's (COSH) spanned many industries and highlighted notable gaps in regulatory attempts to address workplace hazards.

The collapse of a crane at a metro hospital yesterday isn't the first time equipment owned by Rent-A-Crane has been involved in an accident. Two years ago, a man died when a piece of a crane fell. Investigators are trying to determine what went wrong at Deaconess Hospital yesterday.