Judgment, “safety” definition

Each incident is unique. One working definition of Process Safety Incidents is incidents which—in the judgment of responsible, informed, in-plant administrators (such as the shift superintendent or any second-level supervisor)—could reasonably have resulted or actually had resulted in a catastrophic release of highly hazardous chemicals. A catastrophic release for these purposes is a major uncontrolled emission, fire, or explosion, involving one or more highly hazardous chemicals, that presents serious danger to employees in the workplace. 

Safety was defined as the freedom from unacceptable risk. Conversely, safety may be defined as that state for which the risks are judged to be acceptable. These definitions imply a determination of risk, as well as a judgment of the acceptability of risk. Often, when the term acceptable risk is used, the response of the uninformed may be. How dare you suggest that some risk is acceptable. 

Of particular importance for safety professionals is Section 101 (8). This section defines a qualified individual with a disability as any person who, with or without reasonable accommodation, can perform the essential functions of the employment position that such individual holds or desires. .. consideration shall be given to the employer s judgment as to what functions of a job are essential, and if an employer has prepared a written description before advertising or interviewing applicants for the job, this description shall be considered evidence of the essential function of the job. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) provides additional clarification of this definition by stating, an individual with a disability who satisfies the requisite skill, experience and educational requirements of the employment position such individual holds or desires, and who, with or without reasonable accommodation, can perform the essential functions of such position... 

Despite the fact that the mentioned points on the differences in definitions, noncollection data, and under-reporting would affect the level of reliability of comparisons, a great advantage still exists in such comparisons. It enables a judgment of safety situations between countries and it can detect the progress ahead. 

The FMCSA defines a preventable accident as one which occurs because the driver fails to act in a reasonably expected manner to prevent it. In judging whether the driver s actions were reasonable, one seeks to determine whether the driver drove defensively and demonstrated an acceptable level of skill and knowledge. The judgment of what is reasonable can be based on a company-adopted definition, thus establishing a goal for its safety management programs. ... 

As we proceeded with our studies, we found that developing a distinct, perhaps statistical, universally applicable definition of acceptable risk that did not contain general and judgmentally interpretive terms is not possible. But, with a studied understanding of risk, and risk taking, and the concept of As Low as Reasonably Practicable (ALARP), I dare to offer a practical definition of acceptable risk that can be effectively applied when dealing with workplace hazards, risks, and deficiencies in safety and health management systems. 

Hence, it was possible with the support of expert judgments to constrict the reliability-related field data of the whole clamping function in two steps to the safety-related field data of one single safety function. Thereby, the allocation of the malfunction messages to the safety function is not definite, because the messages can also be relevant for further safety functions. Consequently, it is a worst case examination that needs to be stated more precisely in future researches. 

Over time, federal regulatory poHcy on the issue of independent contractor liability ran from one extreme to the other under the 1969 Coal Act at one point, the Interior Board of Mine Operations Appeals (Affinity Mining Co. 1973) held that the key to Hability as an operator was determined by the locus of responsibihty for the health and safety of the miners in question, and that while more than one person may fall technically within the definition of operator, only the one responsible for the violations and the safety of employees can be the person served with notices and orders and against whom civil penalties may be assessed. At the other end of the spectrum, after a district court ruling that independent construction contractors were not within the definition of operator and could not be held liable for violations, the Secretary of the Interior (before that district court judgment was reversed in the D.C. Circuit) instructed all federal mine safety inspectors to issue citations for independent contractor violations only to the operator who hired the contractor (Association of Bituminous Contractors 1975). 

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