This weeks viewings were on health and safety, a subject that's very important to me. As a child my family told me about my paternal grandfather, an electrician who was killed when his company sent him to an unsafe underground job-site. The company knew it was unsafe but sent him anyway (this was in the pre-OSHA 1960's) Without proper personal protective equipment (PPE) he died from toxic gas.
I think that hearing about as well as witnessing a classmate in the second grade die after impaling herself on a pair of scissors has contributed to me being someone who meticulously adheres to safety standards, despite being called a nerd or overly cautious sometimes. I have joined the Health and Safety committee for our Solar Decathlon team and contributed to the Health and Safety Approach we submitted to the Department of Energy last month. Next month I'll be undertaking OSHA's 30 hour training. I haven't accepted the official position of Health and Safety officer for our team yet because I want to make sure our communications are better before I take on that responsibility. I also want to make sure I have the authority to enforce rules.
The UNLV Risk Management person I spoke to while researching our approach said, "The OSHA rule book is written in blood."
