Posted By Andy Brazier I'd not read too much into the specific incident. From what you have said there seemed to be poor control of equipment being used. Also, it sounds like hot work was going to be carried out in an area with flammable material present. You may need a permit to prepare for work to be carried out. This would be separate to the hot work permit, which should be issued once preparations are complete. The way it may work would be Apply for hot work permit - this would identify preparations (do not issue at this time) Apply for permit to carry out preparations Issue permit and carry out preparations Sign-off permit for preparations Confirm preparations complete and issue hot work permit etc.

Posted By Merv Newman "set-up" is ensuring safe access, clearing the hazards, securing the area, laying out equipment and preparing for things to go wrong. At this stage the site should be inspected and permission given or withheld. Only then are you authorised to plug in the kettle. (ok, welder) Final thought : I once had plant manager who told me "Merv, if I ever find that a permit was signed at a desk, or in the control room, you are fired" Merv

Posted By Andy Brazier Ashley I'm not sure if I understand your post correctly. A permit should always be issued for a specific piece of work. You seem to be saying that you would cover preparation and hot work on the same permit. I could not agree with that. However, if you mean get your hot work permit before setting up the welding equipment (after the area has been prepared), that I can agree with.

Posted By Merv Newman Goodness me ! To obtain a "hot work" permit a procedure must be followed which includes all of the steps outlined in my above posting which MUST be correctly carried out BEFORE work-site inspection and subsequent permission to undertake the HOT work. I'll do the same for any other kind of dangerous activity. Line breaks, excavation, confined space entry, whatever. The "dangerous" part of the work DOES NOT START until I am satisfied with the set-up. Which is when I sign the permit and authorise/accept responsibility for the dangerous bit. Sorry about the SHOUTING but I feel very strongly about this. Think about blasting. You can drill the holes, insert the detonators, wire up the lines, shove in the dynamite. But you cannot connect to the bangbox (whats the right word ?) until a supervisor has inspected and said OK. Merv

Posted By garyh I don't think that there is one right answer. It depends on your environment. In my view the most important thing is to have a well defined procedure, train people in it, and ensure it is being followed (eg spot checks. audits etc).

Posted By Andy Brazier Pete48 When you say "IMHO, if the work requires a ptw, the whole task from normal condition back to normal condition (set up back to safe to use again) should be within the ptw procedure" do you mean that it should be under a single permit? I agree it should be within the PTW procedure, but that is definitely not the same as having a single permit.

Posted By Pete48 Andy, I agree with your thoughts that it is either more than one permit (e.g. cold work for set up, hot work for hot work)or it is proceduralised controls for trained staff. It is more common to find proceduralised controls for set up where work is to be performed by "in house" staff and multiple permit for contractors. I see it as a simple way to reduce probability of error in high consequence work tasks. Jon, thanks for the details. Again without experience in marine work places, it makes sense that control of fire on board is of high significance. The recommendations are just about strengthening procedures by forcing the involvement of more than one person in the controls. It is still not fail safe since humans are fallible and have been known to co-operate to overcome tiresome (in their view)obstacles to task completion! If the key to the lock is held by the supervisor of those doing the work this risk is clear and avoidable. I might review our routine mtce to see if we had overlooked any circumstances where a single error by one employee or contractor could have such devastating consequence. If I found any, I would review use of the ptw systems before placing any more physical controls such as locking thing up. How important would it be to have a check system to ensure that the kit had been locked away and the key returned to secure position? Who would do that check? Would you need to record it? The questions just keep flowing and it starts to look very complex to work under and to manage. Only where absolutely necessary! I read the NTSB comments as being about management processes such as ptw, not more physical controls that rely upon the people doing the work.

Posted By Merv Newman OK, I think the general agreement is that, for operations carrying a high level of risk, a written procedure must be followed. And involve a person more senior than those undertaking the work. So, a "work order" can be given which indicates that a "dangerous work" permit will be required. The workers can do the set-up and then call a more senior person who will inspect the work site and then if satisfied authorise, "permit", the dangerous part of the job. On my sites the "senior person" was me. Even at 3am. Except for "live" electrics and that was the site manager. (never happened) For hot work on a Cruise liner the "senior person" would be, for me, the captain. OK, he would need a bit more training than on how to grow a great beard or on what that pointy thing was pointing at but, hey, that's H&S innit ? Merv

Posted By David J Jones Merv, You say "for hot work on a cruise liner the "senior person" would be... the captain." Ultimately, yes, as he/she undoubtably is in the position of the final resting place for "the buck"! But - the captain has sufficient delegated authority in his/her Senior Engineer Officer to ensure work of this nature is properly and correctly controlled at each step. The Engineer Officer would normally raise the hot work requirement at the captain's daily brief (for planned work), or if the hot work is of an unplanned nature (as in it needs fixing right now) then that would be passed to the captain for approval prior to commencing. Any captain worth his/her salt (o.k. - pretty poor pun!) would only give approval after receiving assurance from the EO that all necessary controls were in place. In some instances, the shipping line may require the captain to countersign any hot work permit. That's certainly the way it was done in the "grey funnel line". Regards