That firewatch shift last week almost got me killed

I was working a shutdown at the Chemcorp plant in Gary last Thursday. My job was to watch for sparks while a welder was patching a tank. He finished up and I waited 15 minutes like always, then I saw smoke coming from the insulation 40 feet up. Turned out the hot work permit said we needed a fire watch inside the tank too, but the foreman skipped that part. Has anyone else had a permit get signed off without the full safety checks?

3 comments

3 Comments

miles9461mo ago

Bet your foreman knew exactly what he was doing. Those guys cut corners to save 20 minutes and put lives at risk. The real issue nobody talks about is how the permit system itself gets abused. Foremen sign off on permits without ever walking the job site. They just check boxes from memory or guesswork. I've seen permits approved for confined spaces that never even got a gas test done. Did you file a complaint with OSHA or just let it slide?

west.henry9d ago

Those guys cut corners to save 20 minutes" - yeah, and I've cut so many corners I'm basically a circle by now, just ask my old boss who fired me for it. But seriously, you're right that some foremen will never see a real permit before signing it.

fisher.adam1mo ago

Those guys cut corners to save 20 minutes" - that's probably true for SOME foremen, but not all of them. The Chemcorp foreman I dealt with actually seemed like he cared, he just got rushed by management to clear the job for the next shift. The permit itself was the problem. It said "fire watch inside tank required" in tiny print on page two, buried in boilerplate language. Nobody reads that stuff carefully when you're under the gun. The welder and I both assumed the watch was just outside, since we were working on the roof of the tank itself.