ABSTRACT
In my 20 years as company director of two companies we had only one serious accident. One of our commissioning engineers was found dead on the floor of the plant house at the foot of a 4’ 6” high step ladder. He had obviously climbed the ladder to operate a valve, fallen off, and broken his skull on the concrete floor. There was no sign of carelessness, recklessness, or drunkenness. “Can’t understand it,” all his colleagues said, “John was always so careful. He’d never climb a ladder while holding a notebook or anything like that”. Privately I wondered whether that wasn’t the problem. He had no practice at falling, so when he did have his first fall (as sooner or later everyone will) he didn’t know how to protect himself, so it was also his last.
