Electrical Association

Be Safe: Safety is a Family Affair

Written by Paul "Krmp" Krmpotich

Jim and Jesse Grant recently volunteered their company, Jim's Electric in Baxter, MN, to be the first company to hold MEA's NFPA 70E Safety Training class. Jim and Jesse have a history of providing safety training to their employees as a team. The demonstrations and discussions make everyone aware of the importance of watching out for each other's safety as well as for their personal safety.

The most powerful motivation to watch out for each other seems to be generated by the discussions about what happens to the families of electricians who are seriously injured or killed. There are many stories of electricians who felt worse about the look of fear, love and concern on the face of their wife as she walked into the hospital room—than the fact of their injury.

Those are the stories that bring silence into the room and have the electricians looking at each other and thinking about wives, children, parents and friends.  They work together every day and hear the stories about what the kids are doing and how their families are getting along—whether it is the family vacation, the addition to the house, or saving for an education fund. No one wants to see those dreams lost as medical bills pile up, so the entire team is reminded how much more important it is to watch each other's back on safety than it is to try to finish early on a Friday.

Safety training is about creating many happy endings!  PPE is about sending electricians home to have dinner with their spouse, coach their child's hockey team, and enjoying time with friends rather than paying medical bills. Making mistakes is a fact of life. Having a team of co-workers alert to catching mistakes before they become accidents is the best insurance an electrician can have for working safety.

Regular safety training that "includes keeping the entire family safe" from the burdens of an accident—is one of the most effective ways of turning a group of electricians who work together into a BE SAFE team.

NFPA 70E Training is now available through MEA. It is about much more than just arc flash protection. If you do have an accident while an employee is working on "energized" circuits, OSHA will check to see if you have followed the safety practices in NFPA 70E.  If you have not,
• the final OSHA fines will be higher;
• your work comp insurance premiums will increase;
• bidding for future work based on safety may be limited; and
• an entire family will suffer.

Please look in the Education Section of this newsletter or the www.electricalassociation.com.  If you have questions, please call me, Judi Rubin, or Amy Dvorak and we will get the answers for you.