“I know you think you understand what you thought I said but I’m not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.” —Alan Greenspan I once heard a young operator complain, “All we do around here is safety training. Nobody understands half of it and the other half is just common [...]
“Air raid, Pearl Harbor. This is not a drill.” —Lt. Cmdr. Logan Ramsey, 7-Dec-1941 'Beauty' Ramsey sent one of the most famous telegrams of history after watching a Japanese dive bomber’s payload detonate in Pearl Harbor. Other telegrams went out that morning, from the Navy Yard and Kaneohe, but they were largely ignored until smoke [...]
“If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.” George Orwell, 1984 We’ve all done it. We’re talking about something terrible and rather than calling it what it is, we choose words that are softer, less harsh. Or we call it something that completely hides our meaning. Instead of talking [...]
“It must be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage than a new system. For the initiator has the enmity of all who would profit by the preservation of the old institution and merely lukewarm defenders in those who gain by the new ones.” [...]
“If we accept there is no such thing as ‘zero risk’ then we should not spin the meaning of words with assertions such as ‘all accidents are preventable.’ – Dr. Rob Long In terms of process safety, one definition of risk is, “[The] combination of the frequency of occurrence of harm [the likelihood] and severity [...]
“Unless you go forward then you are going back.” - Greg Lake Check valves (CVs) are routinely installed as safeguards against reverse flow. Just as routinely, check valves are dismissed as safeguards during process hazard analysis. If check valves are of no value, then there is no point in installing them. On the other hand, [...]
“A spark neglected makes a mighty fire.” Robert Herrick During a process hazard analysis (PHA) and a layer of protection analysis (LOPA), the scenario of an external plant fire frequently arises. From our experience facilitating PHAs and LOPAs, we’ve found that a common cause for this is a pooling of flammable liquid or oil getting [...]
“Adversity does not build character, it reveals it” -James Lane Allen I have been very interested in what the press has had to say about process safety issues following Hurricane Harvey. I was also very gratified when the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) put out a warning that start-up was one the most dangerous operations [...]
“If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself.” Henry Ford Your company has had an incident or a near miss, the investigation is closed and the cause has been determined. Now what? In an ideal world, the goal is a return to normal operations with a lower likelihood that the incident [...]
“Everybody handles pressure differently.” Gerry Cooney High Integrity Pressure Protection Systems (HIPPS) are a type of Safety Instrumented System (SIS) used as an alternative to or in conjunction with pressure relief systems. HIPPS were added to the Standards as an alternative to pressure relief valves in August of 1996 after many safety professionals realized that [...]
