The Safety Professional as Detective
Last Wednesday, August 29, firefighters responded to what seemed like a routine restaurant kitchen fire. Little did they know that grease, which had seeped over time from the ventilation system into a 10-inch crawl space, had ignited and burned undetected in the ceiling for more than an hour. The ceiling suddenly collapsed, and firefighters became trapped in the deadliest blaze for Boston firefighters in 26 years. Two firefighters were killed and 10 more were treated for injuries and released.
According to reports in the Boston Globe, the Tai Ho Mandarin and Cantonese Restaurant, currently 8 months overdue for a health inspection, had a history of code violations dating back to 2001, including excessive grease on the kitchen hood, lights, vents and pipes, as well as greasy cardboard boxes being used for storage.
The political question swirling around the investigation is whether the lack of health inspectors – due to budget constraints – was responsible for this restaurant’s health and safety violations “slipping through the cracks.” Federal guidelines mandate that the city of Boston should have between 28 and 30 inspectors – the city currently has 18, cut down from 22 over the last five years.
However, when Thomas J. Goodfellow, director of the Inspectional Services Department’s Division of Health Inspectors, was asked whether inspectors would have detected the problem had the restaurant been inspected regularly, Goodfellow responded that he didn’t know. “Inspectors can’t see the pipe above the hooded area,” he said. When it was last inspected, “no grease had leaked down.”
So basically what I’m hearing from Goodfellow is that there was no way to prevent this catastrophe. Regardless of how many health inspectors are employed by the city, and how regular inspections are conducted; there is simply no way of anticipating this problem.
Nonsense!!!
It is only a matter of time before seemingly benign issues will inevitably combine to create a catastrophe. In this case, greasy boxes and excessive grease in the kitchen were the early warning signs that could have lead to prevention.
Those responsible for monitoring workplace safety have a job more difficult than a detective. While a detective pieces together evidence to determine what happened in the past, a safety professional must piece together evidence to anticipate what might happen in the future.
While I do hope that people can learn from this situation, it is unfortunate that two firefighters had to lose their lives in the process.
