RE: Another tragic case of not reading the manual

["Rick Bishop" <BishopR -at- jcdc -dot- jobcorps -dot- org>]

Dan:  I can assure you that entering into hazardous environments in an industrial setting is not at all unusual.  I personally have entered into a wood dryer superheater chamber at 185 degrees F many times to replace worn fan motor drive belts.  It would take three trips inside, holding your breath each time. One to cut the old belt off and drag it out, one to get the new 10 ft. belt in place around both pulleys, and finally to check the alignment to reduce wear. If it was out of alignment, that might mean several more tirps with wrenches and pry bars. Only if it was severe, would it be scheduled for repair on the next shutdown. I did not consider this to be unduly dangerous at the time and it was standard practice at the facility. In retrospect, I could have easily fallen and been unconcious, gotten hung up in the machinery, or any number of possiblities. But someone always waited just outside with a stop watch and instructions to attempt retrieval if over 60 seconds passed.
If fault is found here, a civil jury would find that the company is liable by not having someone on hand (foreman) that knew the machines inside and out, and how to react to an emergency situation. Their failure to 'know' about the access hatch makes them liable and 'at-fault.'
Remember that the 'user' was in the machine to effect a repair (removing stuck sheets). This probably happened every day and was dealt with on a regular basis in just this way. The 'user' this time unfortunately got hung up in the equipment.
Rick

>>> <Daniel_Hall -at- trendmicro -dot- com> 08/14/03 12:33PM >>>

Chuck argues that we're blaming the user here, and that its =
inappropriate to do so. Not sure I completely agree...

Certainly the manual isn't to blame, and the machine's design might be =
partly at fault.=20

But in this case, the user _is_ to blame. You have to wonder what could =
be done to save someone willing to climb deep into a machine where the =
temperature was 167F minutes before. It's pretty much impossible to =
engineer all the danger out of any complex piece of machinery, since =
it's impossible to underestimate the intelligence of your dumbest user. =
Actually, for the stupid, even a screwdriver is dangerous.

This is Darwin Award material.

Dan