A young bird had got into the habit of flying under the trailer to eat a crust of bread left by a worker each day. At first, he overflew the trailer a few times and flew away at the slightest noise taking only a few bites, because he was very careful with humans. His short experience had taught him that humans can often be very dangerous. Over the weeks, he became more and more reckless, even going so far as to eat the whole piece without worrying about his environment. One fine day when he was enjoying his piece of bread, the last thing he heard was a clap. A fox who that was fonder of a young bird than a piece of bread, swallowed him in one bite.
By becoming complacent, the young bird was no longer afraid of humans and, more precisely, did not take a step back (flying over the place) to see the other dangers that were present. If he had taken a step back every day, he could have identified the fox who had recently been watching him, waiting for the right moment when the little bird let his guard down. Relying on his short experience of the dangers and taking chances to eat more bread each day turned him into a very nice meal for the fox.
There is nothing different on a construction site; young workers want to perform, believing themselves to be invincible and taking chances.
They rely on their short experience. The most experienced become complacent, no longer see the dangers as being real, ignore advice, rely on their flair. This is why there are in place a range of controls, such as risk analyses (take a step back, PIRAT) which must be done every morning and at the change of tasks, health and safety breaks every week… Make teams with an experienced worker and a less experienced one, the right to refuse… Using these means regularly, in a professional way, will avoid finding yourself in the mouth of danger.
The site foxes are hiding everywhere waiting for a worker to lower his guard, take him by surprise and devour him. It is everyone's duty to eliminate all the foxes from the site. But to do so, you must first identify them, get rid of them or at least put them in cages to protect the workers.
Let’s remember that we’re here to work and share it with our families, not to get hurt and become burden for them.
A danger identified is an injury avoided.
