IDEA Human error is to blame for some of the costliest industrial losses and business interruptions Leav ing a roll of paper towels in a turbine The tally US 11 million Pulling the wrong switch and draining the oil from a generator US 23 million Closing a compressor valve that should have remained open A fire and 30 day production shutdown cess design management or maintenance Again culture Roughly two thirds of commercial prop erty losses we see are at least partly to blame on human error FM Global performs approx imately 111 000 visits to clients commercial properties every year not all of them having boilers and other machinery requiring skilled operators We ve documented 1 000 inci dents in the last 10 years caused or worsened by an operator error The average loss in these cases is US 2 million A couple of chemical and power generation accidents broke the US 40 million mark Vulnerabilities Below are some of the most common con tributors to operator error and costly busi ness disruption Addressing them will help you create a safety culture Information overload We once visited a client s new power plant where alarms beeps bells buzzers and flashing lights were going off every 10 seconds Many of these were just signaling routine functions such as pumps starting and stopping At first these stimuli put operators on high alert Gradually however the operators were con ditioned to ignore the warnings Their con ditioning became a problem when the boiler system started malfunctioning With some justification the operators assumed the alerts were false alarms Fortunately there was no explosion Industry research indicates an equipment operator can t respond effectively to more than 150 alerts per 24 hour period or one every 10 minutes Complexity Why such information over load Equipment has become more complex and digitized Twenty years ago the console DON T LET OPERATOR ERROR DESTROY YOUR BUSINESS Create a safety culture that reduces risk prevents business disruptions and fosters resilience BY BRET AHNELL EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT FM GLOBAL Sure insurance may cover the cost of destroyed equipment and short term busi ness interruption but the repercussions can be far reaching and long lasting You risk losing market share revenue brand equity and share holder value These losses can be permanent As a financial executive you re in no position to manage this risk by taking the controls of a chemical factory yourself But what you can do and perhaps must do is ensure your company embraces a safety culture Although it sounds like a platitude your people need to internalize it so that every equipment operator is always empow ered to exercise his or her best judgment Why errors occur Operator errors don t occur in a vacuum In fact some academics claim there s rarely if ever such a thing as pure operator error Rather they say operator errors are more a function of the plant environment e g pro 18 REASON ISSUE 1 2017

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