Near Miss in the Work Place: Importance and Prevention

The Importance of Near Miss Incidents in the Workplace

TASK 1

Near Miss in the Work Place The concept of near miss in the work places is very important in terms of the safety of the workers present in that work place. According to the study of Zhou et al. (2017), it is stated that the term near miss refers to the unplanned events within a specific work places and it is also important to mention that such incidents are not associated with any type of serious injuries and adverse incidents.  Furthermore, it is important to mention that such near miss incidents are capable of causing serious harms to the body of the workers.

Recently I have heard about a near miss incident in the organization in which I am working for last 3 years. In this context, it is important to mention that my company is working in the field of construction work and thus it is quite obvious that there are various chances of getting affected by the accidents in the work place.  In this incident, it was reported by the other workers that in a fine afternoon all the workers were busy in having their lunch in a specific area.  Suddenly, the workers reported a loud sound and it was found that the crane used to lift all the heavy materials were broken. This incident caused a huge loss to the construction site as it one of the major equipment is damaged. However, in this case, there is high chance of facing serious injuries among the workers. As the incident has all the potential to cause serious hazard to the workers.  As per my understanding, such kind of near miss incident can be prevented by using regular inspection of the work place.

TASK 2

From the above case study, it can be stated that in case of Westray coal mine in Plymouth, Nova Scotia, an adverse incidents took place in a coal mine and in this accident almost 26 miners died. Along with this, approximately 170 mine workers were rescued from the site of accidents. After this incident, the charge of investigation was given to the Justice Peter Richard and he was appointed to find out the exact reason of this adverse incident in the work place. Justice Peter Richard submitted a report named The Westray Story: a Predictable Path to Disaster and from this report, it was found that this incident can easily be prevented by taking proper initiatives related to the safety measures.  In this report, justice reported that poor management style of the company was mainly associated with the adverse incidents as it focused more on the production and thereby neglects the safety of the workers in the work place. Moreover, the report also suggested that there was lack of proper training, poor inspection of the work places, and poor use of safety equipment in the work place (Boyle, 2017). 

The case report of the justice Richard claimed that the incident can be preventable by taking proper measures. Therefore, I clearly agree with that claim that it was a predictable path to the disaster happen to this incident.  From the case study, it was observed that no appropriate measures were taken by the management. According to the study of  Reese (2015), it  is stated that proper training is very crucial for the workers before initiating the work. Not only this, but the study also identified that proper safety equipment is mandatory for working in a hazardous condition. From the case report, it was reported that proper training was not provided to the workers as well.
In this case study, the management of the mining company and the workers are the primary stakeholders. In this regard, it can be stated that the duty of the management is to provide proper training to the workers. Moreover, they must follow all the guidelines for maintaining the safety in the work places. Along with this they must take initiatives regarding the removal of unsafe conditions present in the work place. From the side of the workers it is their duty to maintain all the safety procedures by themselves as a part of the safety measures (Lay et al. 2016).

As a role of the occupational health and safety professionals the individual must follow all the safety processes and guidelines so that the health condition of the workers can be managed in a proper manner.  Along with this, the work place health and safety officer must keep all the records related to hazards for future references (Mostafa  & Momen, 2014).