The on-going crisis in Haiti is a stark reminder of the importance of disaster preparedness. Both OHSAS 18001 and ISO 14001 require that an organization establish, implement and maintain procedures to ”identify the potential for emergency situations” in order to be ready and prepared to respond to these situations when they arise (section 4.4.7).
I have been working for [...]
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There seems to be a renewed interest in metrics, measuring and monitoring within OH&S management systems. Given the advances in continuous monitoring technology, this interest often translates into the installation of a host of different monitoring devices with alarms – fire detection alarms, security alarms, gas detection alarms, motion sensor alarms, electrical current alarms, high [...]
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I spent the 4th of July at Disney. It was the first time I have been to Disney in several years. The fireworks display was truly impressive. After the fireworks were over, we made our way back to our hotel using Disney’s transit system. I was once again struck by Disney’s ability to efficiently manage [...]
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June 1 marked the beginning of the 2008 Hurricane Season. Both individuals and organizations in Florida are being urged to review and update their emergency plans to ensure we are ready in case a serious storm comes our way this year. There are articles in the paper on ensuring that our pets are save, putting [...]
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Yesterday, the air traffic control system in Memphis went down. At the time, there were over 200 planes in the air space controlled by the Memphis center.
There were no plane crashes – no one died. Why?
A report on ABC Evening News last night highlighted two key reasons – pre-planning and the availability of an alternate means of [...]
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Emergency Preparedness is an integral part of an occupational health and safety management system. OHSAS 18001:2007 requires that procedures be put in place to both identify and respond to potential emergency situations.
What is an emergency?
According to the dictionary – it is an unexpected occurence requiring immediate action.
One of the critical parts of being prepared for [...]
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Although it is often used as a term of art in the safety field, “management of change” is not a defined term in OHSAS 18001:2007. It is, however; vital to an effective OH&S management system.
Explicit requirements for management of change were added into section 4.3.1 of OHSAS 18001 in the 2007 revision of the standard. [...]
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