IOSH 10 – focus on disasters

24 March 2010

Visitors to IOSH 10 had access to a wealth of expert advice on learning lessons from disasters – while helping to make conference history.

IOSH 10, which is being held in Glasgow’s Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre (SECC), held its very first live conference webcast on Wednesday 24 March. Visitors to the exhibition and those who couldn’t make it to Glasgow were able to see the conference session ‘Disaster! Sharing industry lessons from large-scale incidents’, when it was streamed live to the exhibition space and the computers of people who had registered online to take part.

A substantial audience gathered to see Professor Richard Taylor, visiting professor in civil engineering at the University of Bristol, discuss his research into the organisational and cultural issues underlying major disasters. Professor Taylor’s research has identified several similar issues that that are common to a number of disasters, and he stressed the importance of addressing these alongside the ‘nuts and bolts’ issues that are also crucial to good health and safety.

Rod Sylvester-Evans of RSE Consultants then brought the message home in his discussion of the investigation, recommendations and lessons learned from the 2004 explosion at ICL Plastics in Glasgow.

Visitors to the IOSH stand were also able to take home some of the lessons learned, as IOSH launched its latest book Disasters: learning the lessons for a safer world, with a personal appearance from author David Eves, who was on hand to chat to visitors and sign copies of his book.

“Every inquiry into a major disaster demands that ‘lessons should be learned’ – but all too often, those lessons are soon forgotten and the same mistakes are repeated,” he said. “This book includes stories of successes as well as failures. I hope it will reinforce our collective memory of the lessons we’ve learned from disasters and help someone, somewhere, avoid another catastrophe.”