Accidents are investigated to find out why and how they happened—not to fix blame.  Once we know how and why an accident occurred, we can develop ways to prevent this type of accident from occurring in the future.  Therefore, accident investigation is one of the best ways to prevent future accidents.  We also investigate near-misses.  Near-misses are warnings that help us identify problems so we can avoid accidents.

Employee cooperation is required.  Employees must:

·       Always report any accidents or near-miss immediately so we can investigate the situation.

·       Cooperate with all investigations.

Again, investigate an accident to prevent it from happening in the future, not to assign blame.  Employee cooperation can make a big difference in providing a safe workplace.

Accidents should be investigated immediately when the facts are fresh in everyone’s mind.  An accident investigation includes the following:

ü What happened?

ü When did it happen?

ü Where did it happen?

ü How did it happen?

ü Why did it happen?

ü Who was involved?

And most importantly, how can we prevent it from happening again?

If an accident occurs, the first thing to do is make sure that any injured worker receives needed medical treatment.  If the accident involves a spill or leak, it has to be stopped.  But other than this, we try to keep the accident scene untouched until accident investigation is completed.  During the accident investigation, we try to obtain answers to our questions of who, what, when, where, how, and why.  To answer these questions, may require the help of persons involved and any witnesses to the incident. 

Get eyewitness reports immediately in order to obtain immediate impressions of what happened.  As time passes, a witness may confuse the current incident with something that happened in the past or become confused by what other people say.

Everyone’s help is needed, not only to investigate accidents, but also to take the corrective actions that will prevent future accidents.