Today’s workplace is fraught with safety

hazards
Why are we here today?

You are the teachers,

leaders and
workers of the future
The importance of safety and health for
engineers
• Technological Change
• The risks
• Society’s Response
• A closer look
Technological change
The risks
• New hazards
• Increased accidents
• New unproven concepts, design & materials
• Health impacts

(U.S Department of Labor, 2008)

Society’s response
• Embraces the benefits
• Regulation and litigation
• Structured health and safety organizations
• Insurance
 A closer look
• Society accepts the benefits but not all the risks
• Society placed demands on engineers to reduce risks
• Engineers require training in workplace safety, due diligence and
product liability to protect them

• This presentation focuses on safety in the workplace

• OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH (OSH), also commonly referred
to as occupational health and safety (OHS), occupational
health, or workplace health and safety (WHS),

is a multidisciplinary field concerned with the safety, health,

and welfare of people at work. These terms also refer to the goals
of this field, so their use in the sense of this article was originally an
abbreviation of occupational safety and health
program/department etc.
CONSUMER PRODUCTS
AND
HOME ACCIDENTS
Consumer Products
• Consumer products come in vast array of designs and uses, yet
common to most is a reliance on mechanical engineering
principles in their design, manufacture, or operation.
Consumer Products Accidents
• Accidents occurs when the consumer products fail or brake for a
variety of reasons:
-Inadequate or poor design
-Misuse or abuse of product
-Manufacturing defects
-Improper or defective materials
-Inadequate maintenance
-Improper usage
-Inadequate instructions
Forensic Mechanical Engineering
• Forensic engineering is often called upon to determine the cause of
the failure or the events leading up to the accident.
• Forensic engineering is the application of scientific engineering
methods and techniques in the investigation of products, materials,
structures, mechanical devices or components that fail (brake) or do
not operate as intended.
• In such cases, scientific investigation into the casual factors is
necessary to assist a court in establishing the facts and evidence of
the case. An example might be the products liability.