Response time

By Chris Thompson

People will fall from scaffolding.

They'll cut off their fingers, get buried under trusses and blow out their backs when they're lifting a cinder block. They'll step in front of bulldozers, get buried in trenches and touch the wrong wire.

Some will have the misfortune of suffering unique injuries on construction job sites. According to numerous reports and books, a Vermont railroad project foreman named Phineas Gage accidentally set off a charge that blew a tamping iron through his left cheek and out the top of his head in 1848. The tamping iron landed 25 to 30 yards behind him. Gage lived.

About three months ago, Patrick Lawler, a construction worker in Colorado, planted a 4-inch nail through the roof of his mouth, behind his eye socket and into his brain. He didn't even know it was there until a dentist found the nail after Lawler complained of a toothache. It seems that his nail gun backfired on him.

About 157 years separated Lawler and Gage. In the interim, the construction industry has witnessed millions of accidents, ranging from the gruesome (an 18-inch drill bit through an eye and out the back of the head) to the mundane. In the next 157 years, the construction industry will watch in shock as millions more accidents pop up on work sites around the country. Here's betting that Lawler won't be the last construction worker with a nail in his head.

At the risk of sounding simplistic, accidents happen. They always have, and they always will. No technological, safety or communication advancements will erase human error and equipment malfunctions.

But if accidents are the constant, then response is the variable. How do co-workers respond when the trench caves in? How do companies respond when the nail gun gets a mind of its own? The smart companies have a work force trained to respond to accidents. The smart companies investigate every nail gun they own and invest in top-of-the-line replacements. They don't see accidents as just accidents. They see them as opportunities for improvement.

The dumb companies don't do anything. They give in to the temptation of treating accidents as fate. They figure the odds were bound to work against them sooner or later. In other words, they're cheap, lazy or both.

It's astounding to think that Phineas Gage could meet a similar fate in today's industry. It's sad that it's true.

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