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    BHP Killed Malcolm Phillips Through Neglect

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    Maureen Shelley
    People should be able to go to work and go home. Malcolm Phillips went to work and was killed by a flaw in BHP's work practices. He should never have died and wouldn't have if BHP had better workplace safety

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    BHP Killed Malcolm Phillips Through Neglect

    Uploaded by

    Maureen Shelley
    124 views1 page
    People should be able to go to work and go home. Malcolm Phillips went to work and was killed by a flaw in BHP's work practices. He should never have died and wouldn't have if BHP had better workplace safety

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    BHP killed Malcolm Phillips through neglect

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    People should be able to go to work and go home. Malcolm Phillips went to work and was killed by a flaw in BHP's work practices. He should never have died and wouldn't have if BHP had better workplace safety

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    124 views1 page

    BHP Killed Malcolm Phillips Through Neglect

    Uploaded by

    Maureen Shelley
    People should be able to go to work and go home. Malcolm Phillips went to work and was killed by a flaw in BHP's work practices. He should never have died and wouldn't have if BHP had better workplace safety

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 1

    capacity flow of

    Work is killing me 113,600 litres of water


    a minute. There was no
    grille over the mouth of
    Going to work can be a chore, a bore or enriching and the pipe.
    fulfilling. What it shouldn’t be is deadly. Yet
    thousands of people go to work each day and don’t get Justice Peterson of the
    out alive. Industrial Court said
    For some it’s because a terrorist flies a plane into a BHP “did have in place
    building, for others it’s a failure of safety procedures a serious and relatively
    or because a disgruntled client plants a bomb. complex system which
    was aimed at ensuring
    Industrial accidents kill 3000 people a yearin Australia the safety of relevant
    and injure 80,000. persons.” He said if
    anyone had asked the
    What makes for a dangerous workplace? Does the obvious question of
    culture of an organisation make some workplaces more simultaneous operation
    deadly than others? Or is it, as Gary Bracks of the of the pump with
    Employers Federation suggests, a matter of human diving operations the
    frailty? fatality would have
    been avoided.
    Traditionally heavy industries like mining and
    engineering were considered more dangerous than He rejected the
    white collar occupations. But terrorism is changing argument that
    that. Even in Sydney workers have been killed as a Malcolm’s death was
    result of terrorism.
    caused by human error
    and concluded it was
    Malcolm Phillips was a skilled, experienced diver. He
    because of a failure in
    was killed at the BHP plant in Newcastle when he was
    the system. BHP was
    inspecting a cooling-water pumphouse, which some
    fined $80,000 in the
    one switched on. He was one of three qualified divers
    Industrial Court and
    on the job.
    paid WorkCover a
    3000 people are killed and further $40,000. The
    80,000 are injured in workplace judge took into account
    accidents in Australia each BHP’s 16 prior
    year. convictions when
    making the order.

    The pumphouse extracted water for use in BHP’s Malcolm should never
    steelmaking operations. It was drawn by electrically- have died and if some
    driven high-speed pumps from concrete lined bays one, anyone at BHP
    which were fed with tidal river water through a grille. had asked an obvious
    The bays contained a rotating mechanically-operated question he wouldn’t
    screen designed to filter solids from the water supplied have. Fines remind
    to the pump. employers to follow
    safety procedures but
    Malcolm was under water inspecting the floor of the Malcom won’t come
    bay when the pump was switched on and he was back to his family.
    drawn into the inlet pipe. The pump had a rated
    MAUREEN SHELLEY © 2008

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