Virtual Breakfast Forum – Mar 11, 2021

At this morning’s Virtual Breakfast Forum, members and guests learned the finer details of the October 17, 2017 catastrophe at the ice rink in Fernie BC. It’s a very compelling story – not just looking at the failure of the technical equipment (what failed and how) but looking back in time. What were the decisions made leading up to the tragedy? The equipment failed, but that’s not the whole story to tell.

Jeff Coleman, Technical Safety BC’s Director responsible for Incident Investigation joined us to share this tragic story, where 3 dedicated workers lives were lost to an ammonia release. In this small town in the South East corner of BC, nestled in a valley of mountains, the arena was in close proximity to a number of houses, a nursing home, and a hospital. The organization and the community were severely affected in the days after the incident – residents were evacuated from their homes for a week.

Using the Menti platform, Jeff polled the group during the presentations and some interesting answers were offered.  You can find the questions and responses in his presentation deck which is at this link.

Jeff also shared a pie graph regarding the reasons for technical equipment failures. The top 3 reported were:

• Aging equipment,
• Procedures not being followed,
• Ineffective service

These three issues are issues about management, and in fact are quite manageable – how do we achieve different outcomes? Quite often there is the gap between the person on the floor and management. We need to ensure we’re empowering our teams.

There is a culture of running equipment right up to or past failure, and it’s a culture Technical Safety is working to change. Available on Technical Safety BC’s website, there are a series of valuable resources, including past safety stories and reports. Jeff, Ab or Kate welcome members or guests to reach out with any questions.