Near miss
An incident / accident having the potential for either personal / property damage of environmental impact or both are termed as a near miss.
Benefits of near miss reporting
It has been experienced that the industries where near miss incidents are reported, investigated & recommendation are implemented the rates of accidents are very low compare to industries they don’t report on near misses’ incidents.
We must learn from accidents and near miss to prevent recurrence. The first step in the learning process is investigation of to determine the causes and underlying reasons and why accident and near miss occurs. A thorough investigation to root cause will identify the management weakness. Learning which management system weaknesses are leading to near miss and accident is one of the highest value activities in which company can invest. And learning from near misses is much cheaper than learning from accident.
Difference between near miss and accident
Before reporting near miss you
must understand the difference between near miss incident & incident, as it is matter of
interpretation of individual. However, following example incidents have been provided
for better understanding of concept.
|
NO. |
NEAR MISS |
ACCIDENT |
|
1 |
When a person was walking in a |
A man walking in a warehouse,
tripped |
|
2 |
One vehicle collided with another, but there were
no major injuries or damage. |
One car collided with another car and |
|
3 |
While working at a height, a tool
slipped from the worker’s hand and fell on someone’s head standing below,
there was no injury because he wore a safety helmet on his head. |
While a man working on a height,
tool |
|
4 |
A trip occurred when a worker attempts to walk
through packaging materials dispersed across the floor and nothing happened |
A trip occurred when a worker attempts to walk
through packaging materials dispersed across the floor and had a fracture in
his finger |
|
5 |
A load lifted on the deck fell due
to a |
A load fell on to the deck due to a
sling |
|
6 |
While tightening the bolt your hand slips from
the tool because of the wet hands and luckily no one got hurt. |
While tightening the bolt your hand slips from
the tool because of the wet hands and the tool fell on the foot of the helper
and hurt him badly |
|
7 |
The equipment is not properly
strapped to the surface of the truck, the equipment falls into the middle of
the traffic and the car behind the truck braked in time and the accident was
avoided |
The equipment is not properly
strapped to the surface of the truck, the equipment falls into the middle of
the traffic and the car behind the truck collided with the fallen body and
created a multiple collision |
Barriers to near miss reporting
- Fear of disciplinary action
- Concerned about the record.
- Concerned about reputation
- Fear of medical treatment
- Desire to avoid work interruption.
- Desire to keep personnel record clear.
- Avoidance of paper work.
- Poor understanding of importance