ECH 3602

Accident concept
By
Dr. Mus’ab Abdul Razak

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 Definition

Accident – is an undesired event that

resulted in unwanted deterioration of
• health of a living organism
• value of an organization
• quality of the environment

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 DOSH definition?

An occurrence arising out of or in

the course of work which result in
fatal injury or non-fatal injury.

(DOSH , Act 514) ,P.U.(A) 128/2004

Occupational Safety And Health
(Notification Of Accident, Dangerous
Occurrence, Occupational Poisoning And
Occupational Disease) Regulations 2004

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 OSHA Definitions

Recordable cases

Non-fatal Fatal
Occupational Occupational Lost
injuries Illness Workdays

Non-Fatal cases without Lost Workdays

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 OSHA Definitions

Recordable Cases are those involving an

occupational injury or occupational illness,
including deaths.
Not recordable are first aid cases which
involve onetime treatment and subsequent
observation of minor scratches, cuts, burns,
splinters, etc., which do not ordinarily
require medical care.
 OSHA Definitions

Occupational Illness of an employee is any

abnormal condition or disorder, other than
one resulting from an occupational injury
caused by exposure to environmental factors
associated with employment.
It includes acute and chronic illnesses or
diseases which may be caused by inhalation,
absorption, ingestion, or direct contact.
 OSHA Definitions

Lost Workdays are those days which the

employee would have worked but could
not because of occupational injury or
illness.
Also need to account for diminished long
term performance.
 OSHA Definitions

Nonfatal cases without lost workdays are cases

of occupational injury or illness which did not
involve fatalities or lost workdays but did result
in
1. transfer to another job or termination of employment,
2. medical treatment other than first aid,
3. diagnosis of occupational illness,
4. loss of consciousness,
5. restriction of work or motion.
OSHA Definitions

There are tables of “lost

work days” that are
assigned to losses of
various members of the
body

Fatality is equivalent to
24 worker years
OSHA
Definitions

These “lost work

days” are not only
based on how long it
will take to recover
but also on the
individuals
diminished ability to
carry out the job
function
 Accident Causation Theory

• “Acts of God”
• “Pilot Error” – beginning of
industrial revolution
• “Mismanagement” – current legal
meanings

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 Domino Theory

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 Domino Theory
– Critical Issues
• The factor preceding the accident (the unsafe act or
mechanical or physical hazard) and it should
receive the most attention
• The accidents, not injuries or property damage,
should be the point of attack.
 System-Induced Error

An accident occurs if a triggering event

occurs at a time when the innate error
tendencies of humans as determined by
performance influencing factor lead to an
error in an unforgiving environment

Developed during the 1980’s

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 System-Induced Error

Performance influencing factors

–Physiological and Psychological state
• Low motivation
• Overloaded
–Inadequate training

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 Injury and Loss Statistics

• There are several different statistics

that have been defined and collected
by government and industrial agencies

LAGGING
INDICATOR

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 1 Death = 6000 day ( Lost days)
Borang JKKP 8
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 Fatal Accident Rate (FAR)

FAR=(# of Fatalities x 108)/(Total hrs all

employees)

Based on 1000 workers’ career

40hr   50wk   50 yr 
WCareer =    yr career = 10 5 hr
career
 wk   

Table 1.3 & 1.4 lists several FARs

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Is canoeing is much more dangerous than traveling by motorcycle ?
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 A FAR of 1.2 is reported in Table1-3 for the chemical
industry . Approximately half these deaths are due to
ordinary industrial accidents (falling down stairs, being run
over), the other half to chemical exposures

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 In Class Assignment
The FAR for travel by car is
reported as 57 while that for
travel by air is 240
1) If the average speed of travel
is 50 miles/hr by car and 250
miles/hr by air, determine the
deaths per million miles
travel by car or air.
2) If you are required to make a
round trip from Perlis to
Johor Baharu, which is the
safer mode of transportation
as indicated by the statistics?
 Solution
1) Calculations
 57 deaths   1hr   106 
Car −     
  
8
10 hr 50 miles MillionMiles 
= 0.0114 deaths
MillionMiles

 240deaths  1hr   106 

Air −     
 10 hr  250miles   MillionMiles 
8

= 0.0096 deaths
MillionMiles

2) For a fixed distance, air travel is the safest mode

 Nature of Accident Process in
chemical plant

• Chemical plant accidents follow typical

patterns.
• It is important to study these patterns
in order to anticipate the types of
accidents that will occur.

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 Accident process (steps)

Most accidents follow a three-step

sequence:
• Initiation (the event that starts the
accident),
• Propagation (the event or events that
maintain or expand the accident), and
• Termination (the event or events that
stop the accident or diminish it in size).

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 Accident process
A worker walking across a high walkway in a process plant
stumbles and falls toward the edge. To prevent the fall, he
grabs a nearby valve stem. Unfortunately, the valve stem
shears off and flammable liquid begins to spew out. A cloud
of flammable vapour rapidly forms and is ignited by a
nearby truck. The explosion and fire quickly spread to
nearby equipment. The resulting fire lasts for six days until
all flammable materials in the plant are consumed, and the
plant is completely destroyed.

This disaster occurred in 1969 and led to an economic loss of

$4,161,000. It demonstrates an important point:Even the
simplest accident can result in a major catastrophe.
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 Discuss the accident steps of
the previous accident

In the example the worker tripped to

initiate the accident. The accident was
propagated by the shearing of the valve
and the resulting explosion and growing
fire. The event was terminated by
consumption of all flammable materials.

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 Types of Chemical Plant Accidents

Type of Probability Potential Potential

accident of for fatalities for
occurrence economic
loss
Fire High Low Intermediate

Explosion Intermediate Intermediate High

Toxic release Low High Low

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 Types of loss for large hydrocarbon
chemical plant accidents
Loss
Other
VCE 3%
36%
Explosion
Fires 30%
31%

Explosion Fires VCE Other

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 Causes of losses for the
major chemical
accidents

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 Defeating the accident process
➢ Safety engineering involves eliminating the
initiating step and replacing the
propagation steps with termination events.
➢ In theory, accidents can be stopped by
eliminating the initiating step.
➢ In practice this is not effective: It is
unrealistic to expect elimination of all
initiations.
➢ What is the effective approach??
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Steps Desired effect Procedure
Initiation Diminish Grounding & bonding, Inerting
(eliminate this Explosion proof electrical
step if possible) Guardrails, Maintenance procedure
Hot work permit
Human factor design
Process design
Propagation Diminish (stop Emergency material transfer
propagation) Reduce inventories of flammable material
Equipment spacing and layout
Nonflammable construction material
Installation of check & emergency valves
Termination Increase Fire fighting equipment and procedure
(to terminate as Relief system
quick as Sprinkler system
possible) Installation of check and emergency
shutoff valves
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 Quiz 1
Failure of a threaded 1½ drain connection on a rich oil line at
the base of an absorber tower in a large (1.35 MCF/D) gas
producing plant allowed the release of rich oil and gas at 850
psi and 40°F. The resulting vapour cloud probably ignited from
the ignition system of engine driven recompressors. The 75
high X 10 diameter absorber tower eventually collapsed across
the pipe rack and on two exchanger trains. Breaking pipelines
added more fuel to the fire. Severe flame impingement on an
11,000-horsepower gas turbine–driven compressor, waste heat
recovery and super-heater train resulted in its near total
destruction.
Identify the initiation, propagation, and termination
steps for this accident.
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 Solution

Initiation : Failure of threaded 1 1⁄2 drain

connection
Propagation : Release of rich oil and gas, formation of
vapour cloud, ignition of vapour cloud by
recompressors, collapse of absorber
tower across pipe rack

Termination : Consumption of combustible materials in

process
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 Assignment 1
Write about one major disaster. Explain what had
happened, causes and actions taken, and public
perceptions towards the event. Conclude with your
own perceptions towards the disaster.

Please include elements of PO9 (ethical principle) and

PO14 (Life-long learning) in your writing.

Presentation: e-portfolio and video

Due date : Week 4

 Terima Kasih | Thank You

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