Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Pursuing safety without accident data

[Ray Keefer <psubs2001@yahoo.com>]

Hi,

But just think. The newbies would pay us big bucks to
fly us out and certify  that their sub complies with
our standards. Kind of a morphed PSUBS/ABS bureaucracy
monster. :)

Actually we have touched on this topic repeatedly over
the last 9 years. We could be sued for anything. If an
accident occurs on a sub that was built to our
standards. We could lose the court fight. Well, really
who in PSUBS would be held financially responsible.
Probably Jon and myself.

Therefore PSUBS would insist on surveying every sub
personally to make sure it was really built to our
standards. Just looking for an opportunity to deny
certification, hence deny responsibility. Remember
that ABS does not certify a sub is safe. ABS only
certifies that a sub was built to their standard. We
could adopt the same CYA approach.

Or we could just do what we have decided over the last
9 years. Use any information at your own risk. Use
existing standards. We recommend you consult a real
engineer.

Personally I think a workable standard is a admirable
goal. The bureaucracy to enforce the standard would
drive any backyard builder away. Kind of like ABS. How
many of you are ABS certified? Cost is probably the
number one reason.

Regards,
Ray

--- Rick and Marcia <empiricus@telus.net> wrote:

> IMHO, any sort of formalised documentation would
> attract government.  We would have become yet
> another bureaucracy of our own choosing.
> 
> Rick L
>   ----- Original Message ----- 
>   From: Paul Kreemer 
>   To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org 
>   Sent: Monday, January 09, 2006 12:41 PM
>   Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Pursuing safety
> without accident data
> 
> 
>   I'd expect a lot of people would be in agreement
> on producing a set of guidelines as described by
> Cliff and the idea of design reviews sounds good to
> me.  I think it's mostly a question of how to move
> these solid, very professional procedures from
> government and for-profit corporations into the
> hobbyist, amateur world.  
> 
>   Should PSUBS put together a collection of
> guidelines?  Some informal information is available
> in the PSUBS Design Guidelines and Tools page but
> the ABS, Lloyds, etc. information should be
> referenced too.  Maybe just a well organized index
> of where to find these documents, and what to do
> with the information.  For example, which guidelines
> apply to which stage of your project.  
> 
>   Regarding the independent design review, some
> thoughts are:
>   1) It'd be an interesting chance to review another
> person's hard work,
>   2) A lot of work.  Much time would be needed to
> properly review a design,
>   3) A large responsibility considering the human
> life risk,
>   4) Could it be formalized into a PSUB Design
> Review document?
> 
>   A Design Review doc could be a useful 'study
> guide' both for PSUBers working on their designs,
> and for a review committee looking at a design. 
> Maybe a set of checklists, required drawings, and an
> 'essay' section for describing procedures?  
> 
>   Collecting design and operational guidelines
> sounds like a much larger effort than just
> collecting incident reports.  I myself could help
> design and build a web application to collect and
> present incident reports in a structured way. 
> 
> 
>   Paul
> 
> 
> 
>   On 1/9/06, Cliff Redus < dr_redus@devtex.net>
> wrote:
>     Doug,
> 
>     Thanks for your insightful comments on how to
> progress safety in our PSUB community.  My terse
> digestion of your comments boil down two a few key
> points:
>       1.. focus on the precursors to accidents, and
> shift from outcome measures to process measures 
>       2.. psubs community could implement this
> "focus on the precursors to accidents" by
> establishing an area on the website for lessons
> learned, common mistakes, safety observations.  
>       3.. psubs community could implement a process
> oriented safety focus by encouraging adherence to "a
> set of best safety practices for designing,
> fabricating, testing, operating and maintaining
> psubs" such as design guides developed by ABS,
> Lloyd's,   PVHO. 
>     I for one concur and think we do a lot of this
> through the existing forum.  There is however, a
> missing piece, the independent review.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


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