If you were asked to define “Safety” in one word, what would be your reply?

Would you define safety as alertness, always ready for the unexpected? Would you define safety as skill, the art of being ultra-adept? Would you define safety as experience, asserting that the veteran never gets hurt? Would you define safety as cooperation, the ability to exercise patience and get along with your fellow worker? Or, after due deliberation, would you finally define safety with the use of the single word THINK?

Perhaps Alertness, Skill, Experience and Cooperation could be associated with safety, but these are subservient to the word Think and must be construed as secondary definitions. A well-known business executive has made the word “THINK” synonymous with success, and as in other phases of industry, the application of the meaning of the word is also very necessary if we are to reduce the number of accidents and injuries. As had been so often stated, ninety percent of all accidents are attributed to unsafe acts on the part of the worker, and failure to think before acting is the cause of practically all accidents in this category.

A carpenter removes a guard from a table saw for the purpose of expediency; an injury results. The man/woman has not given thought to the original purpose of the guard and has suffered the unfortunate consequences. Another individual, again in the essence of time, fails to don safety goggles for a project “that will take only a minute.” Again, injury results because of failure to think of the possible negative result. A truck driver is involved in an accident because he knew he had the right-of-way but failed to think that perhaps the second party involved would not recognize this established right.

Many accidents could be averted if we would only discipline ourselves to give full thought prior to the application of our actions.

Think Safety—Then Act Safely

“IF IT’S NOT SAFE, STOP…..DON’T DO IT THAT WAY.”