Last week, I had the fortune of visiting the nuclear power station at Rawatbhatta (Rajasthan). Amongst many things, I really admired the disaster prevention philosophy they had adopted.
In the words of our local escort and guide:
“In today’s world we devote a disproportionately high time in disaster prevention and recovery. However most disasters are usually preceded by major incidents. Major incidents are preceded by incidents -> minor incidents -> Near Misses -> Significant Events -> Events.
However we are so engrossed in firefighting the major incidents that we forget to root cause them. Usually a disaster is a result of series of minor issues that were detected early on, but the people were too busy to address and rectify them.”
Then he went about explaining me the various safety measures deployed and also how every event (no matter how insignificant) is recorded and analyzed. Also how that helps NPCL design better and safer plants etc.
Corporate promotion apart, what I really felt was that this philosophy could be really employed in our everyday life. Rather than trying to locate the last straw that broke the camel’s back, we should really try to do something to the rest of the burden the camel was carrying.
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