The “Click It or Ticket” mobilization period will begin on Monday May 21 through June 3, 2012. “Click It or Ticket” is a cooperative effort among the five traffic safety-related departments under the state’s Business, Transportation and Housing Agency: the California Highway Patrol, Office of Traffic Safety, Department of Transportation, Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, and the Department of Motor Vehicles.

According to the National...

The AAA Foundation website has a quiz that might give all of us a shock when the final results are tallied. Check to see if you are an aggressive driver at:

http://www.aaafoundation.org/quizzes/index.cfm?button=aggressive

The website also has other quizzes that you can access, such as:

• Drowsy Driving • Driving Safety Culture

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I was reading an article in my local newspaper about safe boating and how there have been two serious boating accidents recently in Santa Cruz and Channel Islands resulting in numerous fatalities. I am not a boating enthusiast, but I was surprised to read that there are several boater education courses offered for free from the Coast Guard Auxiliary. Specifically, the article identified a course “Suddenly in Command” which is a class designed for those not generally at the helm, but will help boaters to “be prepared” with the basics in case of an emergency.

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In my two prior blogs on coaching employees I reviewed the importance of identifying unsafe behaviors in the workplace and how get your employees to change their behavior. Now I would like to give you some tips to use for coaching your employees.

Coaching Tips:

• Focus on the unsafe act rather than the employee, their personality, or attitude. • Focus on the unsafe act rather than the outcome. For example, a near miss v. a medical...

I was looking over a number of proposed bills for 2012 and noticed and interesting one. A proposed health and consumer protection measure, AB 2218, would require all new table saws sold in California to have accident mitigation technology by 2015. Active injury mitigation technology means technology to detect contact with, or dangerous proximity between, a hand or finger and the teeth of the blade above the table top of a table saw, and to prevent...

On my previous blog I discussed why monitoring your employee’s behaviors at work can help prevent injuries and what you, as a manager, can do about it. Now, let’s talk about how to do it.

One of the first things is to catch people doing things right! This will encourage them to continue the same correct behavior. When you encounter poor work practices, remind employees that working in an unsafe manner is a bad habit that needs changing. However,...

When managers and supervisors conduct safety inspections, they often times tend to just concentrate on the conditions or “things” that may lead to accidents. While identifying and correcting unsafe conditions is important, it’s just as important to conduct personal safety evaluations specific to each employee’s individual work practices. In other words, “Are your employee’s working safely?”

When it comes right down to it, most injuries are caused by unsafe acts, poor work practices and taking short-cuts. This means the decisions people are making are most often responsible for their injuries and accidents. Good decisions usually result in good outcomes, whereas bad or improper decisions usually lead to an accident. The laws of probability are also associated with accidents and injuries. For every serious disabling accident, several occur that only result in minor medical treatment, and for each of these, many smaller accidents or near misses take place. By reducing minor accidents and near misses, the probability for a serious injury is also reduced. That’s why it’s important to identify and eliminate hazards and/or the unsafe employee behaviors that may lead to an accident.

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The article on the front page of the Saturday, February 11th New York Times caught my eye. I have a love-hate relationship with technology. I love it when it works, and hate it when I can’t figure out what went wrong or what to do next. The article, written by Nicole Perlroth, was about digital thievery and went on to describe how easy it is to have your personal and corporate information hacked via your smart phones and portable laptops.

One of the areas we discussed during the driver safety webinar was distracted driving. We all have probably seen examples of distracted drivers: talking on the phone, texting, eating, grooming; children; pets; etc. The list goes on and on. Now the question we need to ask ourselves is, “Am I a distracted driver?” If so, you need to change your driving behaviors. According to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), every day there are more than 15 people...

We hope you enjoyed today’s webinar on Driver Safety. One of the things we talked about was the 40 mph off-set crash conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). In this test, they used a 1959 Chevy Impala to crash into a 2009 Chevy Malibu to demonstrate which vehicle would be the safest to be in during a collision. Many of you felt the Impala would have fared better in this collision because it is significantly heavier and larger...

For more than 24 hours, Dante Autullo had a 3 1/2-inch nail embedded in his brain and didn’t know it. Autullo, 32, of Orland Park, Illinois, accidentally shot himself in the back of the head with a nail gun while working in his garage. He thought his injury was just a laceration and that the nail had whizzed past his ear. But he felt nauseous and a CAT scan revealed the nail’s presence. While the nail was able to be removed and Autullo is expected to make a full recovery, this incident could have been prevented. According to OSHA, nail gun injuries are responsible for approximately 37,000 emergency room visits each year...

Have you ever noticed that public transit buses don’t have seat belts?  Sure the driver has one and if this is a Paratransit Bus, the have them for all seats.  But did you know that each wheelchair station on a bus has them too?

Unfortunately,  the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) states that seat belts for wheelchair users can only be required when all passengers on board are required to use them.  This would be your Paratransit buses.

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Scooters are 3 or 4 wheeled mobility devices.  They have a steering column and one electric motor.  They are considered a “common wheelchair’ if they meet the size requirements (30” wide, 48” long and 600 lbs. or less with occupant).

They are very unstable and difficult to secure when occupied.  Did you know that most, if not all scooter manufacturers state in their literature that their product should not be occupied in a moving vehicle?

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When a passenger boards your bus riding a wheelchair, what is your agencies policy for securing the wheelchair to the bus?  Is this policy in writing?  Is it published?  Is there a sign on-board that states the policy?

The ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) states that bus transit agencies can make securement of common wheelchairs mandatory if there is a written policy stating the requirement.   We know that wheelchairs need to be tied down...

When wheelchair passengers use the lift on a transit bus, is there a safety belt used?  Some lifts have them for the factory, some don’t.  It really depends on the manufacturer.

What do these safety belts do?  When properly installed and adjusted, they ensure the passenger does not fall off the lift. 

A cool feature of lifts equipped with these belts is that they are interlocked with the lift operation, so when not connected, the lift...

When a bus transit passenger rides a wheelchair lift, which way should they face?  Toward the bus or away from the bus?

·  If you ask the lift manufacturer, they will say away from the bus with the riders back nearest the vehicle or backed onto the lift.

·  If you ask the safety guy, he says back it onto the lift facing away from the bus.

·  If you ask the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) regulations, they say:

“Except...

I had the opportunity to attend the 2011 APTA Bus & Paratransit Conference in Memphis, TN in May.  It is always great to learn about the new technology that is available to help solve safety problems in bus transit.  Two products were very interesting and I wanted to share them.

Safe Turn Alert by ProTran 1  (www.protran1.com)



Safe Turn Alert has been out for about 2 years and provides...

I heard on the news this morning that the US Military is finally going to respond to concerns voiced by our female military service personnel regarding the improperly fitting gear they are required to wear. One-size does not fit all. And it’s not about how the uniform looks it’s about how the personal protective equipment fits, like the body armor. When the body armor doesn’t fit correctly, it can actually contribute to the severity of the injury....

While I’m in Washington DC in May, I’m going to attend an event at the U.S. Department of Labor to lend support to the unveiling of their 2010 Seat Belt Use Survey. It’s amazing how many people still don’t wear their seat belts. My first introduction to the use of seat belts was in 1965 when my dad installed seat belts in his car—cars didn’t automatically come with seat belts in those days. His forethought in installing those seat belts saved his life in 1966. ...

It’s spring. There are blue skies interspersed with spring showers. The trees are starting to bud, flowers are starting to bloom, and you can smell the earth waking up from its winter nap. It is a time of joy and renewal. And it is a time to remember. April 28th is International Workers Memorial Day. A day set aside to remember and honor those workers killed, disabled, injured or made unwell by their work. Workers' Memorial Day was started by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) in 1984. In 1985, the Canadian Labour Congress declared April 28th as an annual day of remembrance to commemorate the anniversary of the Canadian comprehensive Workers Compensation Act of 1914. Today, Workers' Memorial Day is recognized as a national day in many countries including: Argentina, Belgium, Bermuda, Brazil, Canada, Dominican Republic, Luxembourg, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Thailand, Taiwan, United States and the United Kingdom. ...

I’m excited! I’m going to be speaking about distracted driving at the American Society of Safety Engineers’ North American Occupational Safety & Health Week (NAOSH) events at the Capitol in Washington DC in early May. I will be one of several speakers who will be talking about what their employers are doing to reduce motor vehicle loss incident. Did you know that motor vehicle incidents are still the leading cause of workplace fatalities in the...

Did you know that law enforcement agencies throughout California are focusing on distracted driving during the month of April? They are watching for and citing distracted drivers. Drivers who are texting or using handheld telephones while driving. The first ticket starts at $159, but can be higher. Subsequent citations are increasingly more costly....

First, on Saturday, March 25, a fire broke out on the 8th, 9th and 10th floors of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory located in the Asch Building in New York City killing 146 young women and men.

 

The workers were trapped in the building. The exit doors...