Posted By CFlanagan I am in the process of pulling a training package together for risk assessment and would like to answer a question as part of the training about where risk assessment came from initially and who developed the first principles of risk assessment before it was laid down in legislation. I seem to rememember someone once telling me about NASA but not sure if this is true? Can anyone help? Thanks

Posted By Brian Hagyard C I think NASA developed HACCP (Hazard analysis and Critical Control Points) as a principle now widely used in the food industry. (its just risk assessment really but you know how people like to sound different!) Brian

Posted By Kieran J Duignan Analytically, assessung risks emerged as a focus in safety and health management as the starting point in a reliable, valid strategy for responding to uncertainties of hazards in the work environment. Historically, risk analysis has long been a starting point in medical diagnosis. This in turn coloured quantitative methods of testing and licensing pharmaceutical drugs. This contrasts with other kinds of responding to uncertainties in the environment, such as gambling which can be regarded as the more or less conscious strategy of organisations who choose not to quantify hazards and assess risks they pose.

Posted By Emyr Evans I always quote during training days that the term "risk assessment" was first used in UK law when COSHH & then Noise at Work regs first appeared on the radar screen - a short while before the 6 pack mentions them for all work activity.

Posted By Crim HASWA1974

Posted By Roly Buss If you do a "find" on the HASAW pdf on the HSE web for "assessment" you will discover that there is no mention of the word in HASAW. John Ridley, who was heavily involved in the discussions in Europe on the 6 pack, always maintained that risk assessment came about as a result of the differances between UK and continental legal systems, and the suggestion (from the UK) of risk assessments to overcome these led to its introduction. It is always quite staggering if you look at H&S material (books, journals, videos etc) produced before 1992, that there is absolutely no mention whatsoever of risk asessment. Life as H&S professional was a lot harder as a result. Roly

Posted By Terry H I am sure that risk assessments hail from way back in time. But i seem to remember the insurance sector may have been responsible for how we see risk assessments today.

Posted By Pete48 Risk assessment has roots way back in time especially with regard to the statistical basis of determining risk. Some say due to the need to work out how to avoid losing games of chance. (google Girolamo Cardano) In a modern workplace setting, it has existed for many years as a technical tool, a science based statistical approach. I was using what was then called quantified risk assessment way before 1974 for example. The arrival of a more explicit duty as part of the six pack Regs in the UK in the early nineties is probably where most would see it as becoming an everyday part of many workplaces. For some reason that I never fathomed the outcome of requiring all sorts of stuff involving almost every employee and slavishly following very basic methods for determining "risk" seems to been followed by many. Anyone who has struggled with assessments that are more revisionist (perception based) than statistically valid will I hope understand my meaning. In terms of workplace related risks, it became more explicit beyond the technical approach after the early nineties and took on a much more perception based approach and it is continuing to develop more as a liability management tool rather than a technical, science based decision guiding process.(beyond the high risk sectors that is) So the assessment of risk has been around since someone moved from what Bernstein described as "risk is a construct, before risk there was fate" into a position of trying to determine the probability of things. Now there's s riveting load of useless information for you. LOL

Posted By John Packer This should of developed at about the same time as our ability to reason and grasp abstract concepts i.e, predict things that may happen in the future as opposed to what we know happened in the past. As I understand it we started to develope these skills as a race about 40,000 years ago. Unfortunately the human race is enormous and so some people still haven't crossed the starting line. Millitary strategy is in no small part based on risk assessment and so from that point of view is 4,000 years old at the very least.

Posted By safetyamateur "When I first saw a Heidelberg platen printing machine with its characteristic "windmill" gripper system, it seemed to have blatantly unguarded trapping areas." Graham, the single most wonderful sentence I have ever read on these pages. And a great thread, btw. Such a simple question but all this information tumbles out. Enjoying this one very much.

Posted By Robert K Lewis Glyn Surely that was a risk/benefit decision:-)!!!! Bob

Posted By Mark Eastbourne "Fear of harm ought to be proportional not merely to the gravity of the harm, but also to the probability of the harm." Published in 1662 by Antoine Arnauld.