how confidence, not curiosity killed the cat

I awoke last sunday morning to the ringing of the phone. My security officer was calling from the office and he relayed news that there was an electrical explosion at the mechanical area of the building injuring three of our employees. Damn! That was not the wake up call I wanted to hear. Fear had crept through my spine anticipating a wost-case scenario. As I drove myself to the hospital, the only question in my mind was... why were they working on a "live" 440-480V panel board? As I pulled over, one of our employee was already in place to assist me in parking and he updated me abou the condition of the three people and asi I walked into the emergency room felt relieved when I saw my boys wrapped in bandages but moving about in their bunks. Relief turned into a bit of comedy when one of the attending physicians jokingly said that the boys were a bit late for a halloween party.

Two of them suffered from 2nd degree burns to the their faces and their arms while the other was more shocked than anything else. I need not ask them for explanations since they started talking the minute I arrived to explain what had happened. Bottomline? Confidence!!! Having worked with electricity almost all their lives, shutting down power for ten minutes seemed too bothersome a protocol to follow. Wearing safety equipment (gloves, boots, overalls, eye protection) seemed like a waste of time...

Right now, they are all safe and I am relieved. I just hope that this excursion to the pain zone will give them enough time to recognize and accept that protocols were made for everyone's good.

Note:

shutting down the supply for ten minutes would have been just that... 10 minutes. Instead, the entire building lost power for several hours, the panel board and the wires replaced (and that's not cheap), the incident scared the shit out of their relatives and friends, hospitalization, not to mention the amount of pain they are in right now, and the fact that they have just broken the company's safety record of zero accidents in the last two years.