“We might just as well reprimand a light-bulb for going out” than tell people to be more careful: Trevor Kletz and his classic aphorisms

There’s no use telling people to be more careful, “We might just as well reprimand a light-bulb for going out”.

Trevor Kletz with his classic aphorisms about focusing on error and blame when we should instead be improving the design of workplaces and plant.

Other extracts from his 1976 article ‘Accident Data – the need for a new look’:

· Even by 1976, Kletz was critical of conventional safety indicators – “I have in front of me the annual accident analysis prepared by one division of a large chemical company. There are twelve pages of tables in which accidents, measured in various ways, are tabulated”

· “The methods used for measuring accidents are: Number of lost-time accidents, number of alternative work accidents, number of accidents classified as causing a specified degree of injury, number of minor accidents, lost-time accident frequency rate, alternative work accident frequency rate, minor accident frequency rate, number of fires”

· “No conclusions are drawn in the accompanying text and no recommendations are made. One is left wondering who studies these graphs and tables and why they are produced”

· “I suspect that few people give them more than a quick glance and that most copies are consigned straight to filing cabinets, never to see daylight again”

· “My main objection then to many traditional accident statistics is that they are useless; little or nothing of value is done as a result. A second objection is that they are historic; only when enough fitters have fallen off ladders we can detect a rise in this sort of accident and start asking ourselves what we should do”

· Also, “even in a large company, it may be several years before the sample size is large enough to be statistically significant, though if the fault rate is high useful results may come out sooner”

· “The way to prevent such accidents is not, of course, to censure the drivers, or to threaten them with penalties, but to accept that even the most experienced driver may have an occasional lapse and to design the equipment so that such lapses are less likely to produce an accident”