John Noakes climbs Nelson's Column. Health and Safety, pah!

[WinstonWolf]

31st May 1977, John Noakes climbs Nelson's Column on a wobbly ladder. No safety harness, no helmet and wearing flares. Just to clean some pigeon poo.

For good measure the workman has a fag on while shovelling poo...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HW3daihiY30

This was mainstream kids TV in the seventies, it's no wonder my generation shakes our heads at snowflakes and their 'safe spaces'

[KAgantua]

Fred Dibnah laughs at your puny column, Mr. Noakes.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

How many people died or were seriously injured in high risk jobs in 1977, compared to today?

[captain_cynic]

TwigtheWonderkid said:

How many people died or were seriously injured in high risk jobs in 1977, compared to today?

Yep,

Anyone who has worked on any large engineering project has a figure for expected deaths and injuries. All of that has to be factored into the financials (sounds cold, but has to be done for any large project to work). This figure is much lower than it was in the 90's, let alone the 70's and most of the current deaths are from caused by people not following procedure (people who mock health and safety have usually never used an oxyacetylene torch).

Also, if watching someone clean bird dirt of a column was mainstream kids TV in the 1970's... I'm glad I was born in the 1980's.

[anonymous-user]

captain_cynic said:

Yep,

Anyone who has worked on any large engineering project has a figure for expected deaths and injuries. All of that has to be factored into the financials (sounds cold, but has to be done for any large project to work). This figure is much lower than it was in the 90's, let alone the 70's and most of the current deaths are from caused by people not following procedure (people who mock health and safety have usually never used an oxyacetylene torch).

Also, if watching someone clean bird dirt of a column was mainstream kids TV in the 1970's... I'm glad I was born in the 1980's.

I would think kids would have an interest in watching someone do that.
There's a real sense of jeopardy.

Love the bloke having a fag with a trowel full of pigeon st.

There is a great YouTube video of Dibnah bringing a chimney down and realising he has the angles a bit wrong so has to leg it as it crashes down next to him.

[captain_cynic]

desolate said:

I would think kids would have an interest in watching someone do that.
There's a real sense of jeopardy.

Love the bloke having a fag with a trowel full of pigeon st.

There is a great YouTube video of Dibnah bringing a chimney down and realising he has the angles a bit wrong so has to leg it as it crashes down next to him.

IIRC, Dibnah was a bit of a showman with his stunts. Same with most stuntmen, no one would watch it if they didn't play up to the crowd/audience. It wasn't just some bloke up a ladder scraping pigeon poo off stone.

With the wealth of kids entertainment available these days, I'm pretty sure my 7 yr old nephew would switch over from some bloke on a wobbly ladder. Tayo the bus would be more enthralling.

[Collectingbrass]

captain_cynic said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

How many people died or were seriously injured in high risk jobs in 1977, compared to today?

Yep,

Anyone who has worked on any large engineering project has a figure for expected deaths and injuries. All of that has to be factored into the financials (sounds cold, but has to be done for any large project to work). This figure is much lower than it was in the 90's, let alone the 70's and most of the current deaths are from caused by people not following procedure (people who mock health and safety have usually never used an oxyacetylene torch).

Also, if watching someone clean bird dirt of a column was mainstream kids TV in the 1970's... I'm glad I was born in the 1980's.

I have worked on large engineering projects (construction of national infrastructure in rail, roads, telecoms, school, residential and airports) for the last 30 years and that is frankly uninformed rubbish. Safety incidents do not and have not featured in any commercial risk register I have prepared or managed, nor any on the current £750m / pa capital investment programme I am part of the leadership team for, nor do they across the industry. To say they do is to suggest that companies are willing to be found guilty of corporate homicide.

As to TwigtheWonderkid's question, currently circa 30 people a year are killed in construction trades across the UK now, well 2016/17, (http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/industry/construction/index.htm) and 130 were killed in 1977 (https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/tables/ridhist.xlsx). 1 is too many, but the efforts the industry is putting in are bearing fruit.

And I'd sooner watch anything John Noakes got up to than Pokemon.

[anonymous-user]

captain_cynic said:

IIRC, Dibnah was a bit of a showman with his stunts. Same with most stuntmen, no one would watch it if they didn't play up to the crowd/audience. It wasn't just some bloke up a ladder scraping pigeon poo off stone.

With the wealth of kids entertainment available these days, I'm pretty sure my 7 yr old nephew would switch over from some bloke on a wobbly ladder. Tayo the bus would be more enthralling.

I don't doubt Dibnah knew what he was doing.

I like a bit of nostalgia like this but times change.

My kids are older now but I would have thought if one of their own was to do this they would lap it up.
I may be misremembering but I think BP was aimed at slightly older kids - say 10 to 14?

[captain_cynic]

Collectingbrass said:

captain_cynic said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

How many people died or were seriously injured in high risk jobs in 1977, compared to today?

Yep,

Anyone who has worked on any large engineering project has a figure for expected deaths and injuries. All of that has to be factored into the financials (sounds cold, but has to be done for any large project to work). This figure is much lower than it was in the 90's, let alone the 70's and most of the current deaths are from caused by people not following procedure (people who mock health and safety have usually never used an oxyacetylene torch).

Also, if watching someone clean bird dirt of a column was mainstream kids TV in the 1970's... I'm glad I was born in the 1980's.

I have worked on large engineering projects (construction of national infrastructure in rail, roads, telecoms, school, residential and airports) for the last 30 years and that is frankly uninformed rubbish.

Then you simply haven't been involved enough. We can pretty much be certain you haven't worked in the planing and management part of any large project.

I've worked on large oil and mining projects. When building an oil rig they expect accidents and deaths (how many depends on where you build it, Korean shipyards are usually better than Thai). If you think that no-one is costing the potential injuries or deaths on any project where there is a risk of injury, you're woefully ignorant.

Also sounds like you know nothing about the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide act. If companies didn't calculate risk, they would be guilty of negligent manslaughter (unintentional killing). Homicide implies intent, this means they picked a worker out for death.

The costing is part of the over-all risk management strategy, this is the thing that they use to indemnify themselves against corporate manslaughter to demonstrate that they took all reasonable steps to ensure that deaths and injuries don't occur. Did I mention that people sometimes ignore health and safety? Well they do and this is where we expect deaths and injuries. Even though they ignored safety instructions, companies are still liable for compensation. That's the main reason it needs to be quantified and costed.

[WinstonWolf]

captain_cynic said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

How many people died or were seriously injured in high risk jobs in 1977, compared to today?

Yep,

Anyone who has worked on any large engineering project has a figure for expected deaths and injuries. All of that has to be factored into the financials (sounds cold, but has to be done for any large project to work). This figure is much lower than it was in the 90's, let alone the 70's and most of the current deaths are from caused by people not following procedure (people who mock health and safety have usually never used an oxyacetylene torch).

Also, if watching someone clean bird dirt of a column was mainstream kids TV in the 1970's... I'm glad I was born in the 1980's.

We weren't watching the bloke cleaning bird poo (with a fag on), we were watching him climb a ladder up the side of sodding Nelson's Column

You can see why we frown a bit about 'safe spaces'.

[anonymous-user]

WinstonWolf said:

You can see why we frown a bit about 'safe spaces'.

I don't see why there needs to be that connection.

[captain_cynic]

desolate said:

I don't doubt Dibnah knew what he was doing.

I like a bit of nostalgia like this but times change.

No doubt he did. The problem is you just can't top that easily these days, Felix Baumgartner had to travel to the edge of space, even then the risk was minimal and the feat was just getting there. Dibnah and the great stuntmen are a bit before my time, but I can still appreciate them.

I'm sure in Dibnah's day, there were crusty old curmudgeons saying that he wasn't as good as Sir Edumnd Hillary... My theory is that there have always been and always will be curmudgeony old whiners who think that young people are bad and things were better in the Good Old Days(tm). Not to say all old people are whiners, quite the opposite its a case of the minority ruining it for the majority.

[GAjon]

If Health and Safety actually focused on keeping workers safe and healthy instead of arse covering, maybe the work environment would be a safer place.

[captain_cynic]

desolate said:

WinstonWolf said:

You can see why we frown a bit about 'safe spaces'.

I don't see why there needs to be that connection.

Because belittling other generations makes him feel better about being a failure. Just ignore it.

[WinstonWolf]

captain_cynic said:

desolate said:

WinstonWolf said:

You can see why we frown a bit about 'safe spaces'.

I don't see why there needs to be that connection.

Because belittling other generations makes him feel better about being a failure. Just ignore it.

Bless, would you like a safe space while we talk about the seventies?

[anonymous-user]

GAjon said:

If Health and Safety actually focused on keeping workers safe and healthy instead of arse covering, maybe the work environment would be a safer place.

There is overwhelming evidence that that is exactly what H&S has done.

[WinstonWolf]

desolate said:

GAjon said:

If Health and Safety actually focused on keeping workers safe and healthy instead of arse covering, maybe the work environment would be a safer place.

There is overwhelming evidence that that is exactly what H&S has done.

Genuine H&S, such as what Noakes did back then, yes. Wearing a high viz jacket while painting inside a house?

[Shaw Tarse]

Was it this day in history?

[anonymous-user]

WinstonWolf said:

Genuine H&S, such as what Noakes did back then, yes. Wearing a high viz jacket while painting inside a house?

Of course that's exactly what h&s is.

I'd forgotten what a prize one you are and regret posting now.
Shame as I really enjoyed watching the clip last night and going on a you tube click journey.

[WinstonWolf]

desolate said:

WinstonWolf said:

Genuine H&S, such as what Noakes did back then, yes. Wearing a high viz jacket while painting inside a house?

Of course that's exactly what h&s is.

I'd forgotten what a prize one you are and regret posting now.
Shame as I really enjoyed watching the clip last night and going on a you tube click journey.

When I was sixteen I worked in a foundry, I had a bucket of molten steel swinging on a crane and my only protection was a pair of riggers boots and a leather apron. High viz painting inside a house is arse covering.