Photo credit: Frédéric Bisson/zigazou76 on Flickr

Today I have a safety hero tale for you. It comes from my friend Christine Saruyama, whose quick thinking and action probably saved a couple of lives. I’ve been collecting stories of danger from my contacts on Facebook and Twitter, and this one really stood out to me.

Years ago, Christine was working at a car dealership when she walked outside and found two coworkers in danger of electrocuting themselves.

“I went out the doors to find the two lot attendants ‘fixing’ an electrical cord. It was raining and they were standing outside in a puddle of water with the cord plugged into the wall outlet,” Christine wrote. “The casing for the plug part itself was completely cracked open, hanging in two pieces, and they were trying to tape it together so they could use it to plug in the vacuum cleaner.”

She told them to stop but they didn’t listen, so she hurried back inside to find a supervisor.

“They didn’t believe there would be a problem – and also I was a girl so what did I know anyway!?” she said. “Yah!! I should’ve just left them to it, but I had to tell their manager and thankfully he ran out there just in time.”

Speak out

Christine’s response happens to be exactly what’s called for in WorkSafe BC Regulation: 3.10 Reporting unsafe conditions.

“Whenever a person observes what appears to be an unsafe or harmful condition or act the person must report it as soon as possible to a supervisor or to the employer,” it reads.

Kudos to Christine and thanks for sharing this story. I’d like to hear what kinds of dangerous workplace situations you’ve seen, so please email me at susan@speakingofsafety.ca