The effect of reporting near misses on large construction projects.

• Author: McKay, Brian
• Position: SAFETY

There is one thing I know for sure: if someone wanted to start an argument between two safety professionals, there are few topics more contentious in the safety game than the definition of the near miss. While admittedly a pedantic lot, safety professionals will find themselves debating the simple (non)-event for hours on end, leaving bystanders nostalgic for the likes of a long line at the DMV or even the highly caffeinated "chatty" arm rest hog on that last flight down to Seattle. The problem in defining the term can be summarized by that ever present philosophical dichotomy of whether one considers themselves a "lumper" or a "splitter." In this context, lumpers are people who mentally emphasize the similarities of an event instead of the differences, and, according to Wikipedia, splitters are those people who reject simplistic classifications and would rather emphasize the differences. Just to emphasize the point, even comedians like George Carlin had hinted that there is a problem with the language when he quipped, "Here's one that they just made up: 'Near Misses.' When two planes almost collide, they call it a near miss. It's a near hit. A collision is a near miss."

For the purpose of this article, a near miss can be defined as any combination of unsafe actions or conditions presenting themselves at the site of work that exposes personnel, equipment, facilities, or the environment at undue/unplanned risk or harm, however remote. In the interest of full disclosure, the author of this article would be defined as a lumper. A lumper defines both the unsafe conditions and unsafe behaviors as a near miss with the understanding that any event, however small, can contribute to the development of a knowledge base of what exactly is going on at the work site; working conditions meet big data. The goal of this article is to report out on recent research on the subject where a near miss management program was applied during a large petrochemical construction project. The near miss program will be reviewed and the results and impact discussed.

This article is about a novel type of near miss program that was designed and implemented during a heavy phase of construction on an LNG (liquefied natural gas) plant overseas. It was a comparatively large multibillion dollar project with a peak manpower of 7,500 international and expatriate personnel. The safety performance of the project measured by incident rates, a modest 0.45/100 which compared to the US average of 4.0/100 full time construction personnel (Bureau of Labor Statistics 2011 Data), is a remarkable achievement. However, those numbers represent injuries to people, so any number above zero should not be tolerated, and it wasn't. The near miss program's goal was to stop all injuries specifically targeting the first aid; a typical approach where it is considered pertinent to stop the small stuff so that the serious injuries do not occur.

The importance of the near miss in improving safety performance has been well known and used in many highly technical, complex, and error light industries according to James Reason in his work Managing the Risks of Organizational Accidents (1997). Mature industries such as oil and gas refining, nuclear fuel production, air traffic control, chemical processing, and others have reported successful utilization of...