Joan's Lessons Learned

Joan points to a fume hood.

Joan pointing out energy conservation features on a fume hood in the Rabinowitz Lab at Princeton University. Not all of her interactions with fume hoods have been so convivial.

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Transcript: Joan's Lessons Learned

00:01

So far on EHS stories, we've covered radiation spills, poisonous metals and a potentially explosive package, but these make up only a very small part of the many safety issues that concern the Princeton University Office of Environmental Health and Safety. In our 50 plus years in existence, our staff has handled a dizzying array of hazards, incidents and procedures, from the monumental to the mundane. Some of us have been around long enough to experience nearly all of what the job has to offer. Ever wonder what you'd do if you encountered a giant rodent or found yourself in an elevator with a mysteriously smoking drum? We'll explore these stories and more in this episode of EHS Stories, Dramatic Tales From the 50 Year History of Environmental Health and Safety at Princeton University. 

I'm your host. Jim Sturdivant. Please join me as we once again dive into the colorful, and sometimes shocking, annals of the ongoing effort to mitigate hazards, prevent illness and injury, prepare for the unexpected and keep people safe at one of the world's great research universities.

Joan Hutzly is a bit of a legend here at Princeton University. In her nearly 40 years working as a safety specialist, Joan has seen it all, from major weather events to public health crises and campus-transforming construction projects. Over that time, she's collected a wealth of stories, some of which she shared at a symposium on storytelling held at Princeton in October of 2022. 

Joan's talk, which I was fortunate enough to moderate, was a funny, candid and engaging collection of personal anecdotes in which she shared memorable on the job experiences and invited the audience to offer feedback on what lessons could be learned from them. Her personality really shines through, and the whole session offers an eye opening look at the challenges faced by EHS professionals and how the profession has evolved over the last 40 years. 

The symposium was presented by CSHEMA, the Campus Safety, Health and Environmental Management Association. The mission of CSHEMA is to support and educate EHS professionals working in campus environments. The organization partnered with Princeton EHS in bringing this symposium to Princeton University.

And now without any further ado, here's Joan Hutzly's presentation: My Stories, Valuable Lessons Learned. 

Good afternoon, everybody. As most of you already know, I'm Jim Sturdivant, the senior communications specialist at Princeton EHS, and I'm here to introduce my esteemed colleague, Joan Hutzly. Joan has worked as a lab safety specialist with Princeton University for 37 years. She has a wide range and depth of experience and knowledge managing the fume hood evaluation program, conducting asbestos and lead sampling, industrial hygiene, exposure and noise monitoring and respirator fit testing. She also assists with hazardous waste, radiation safety and indoor air quality investigations. Take it away, Joan

03:42

Story One: The Rat in Dial Hall

Thank you, Jim. So I was sitting over there waiting for my turn, and everybody was talking about how you have to take things out to be more powerful and get your point across. And I'm thinking I needed to add more to fluff it up and get to the time, because this is a lot of time to use, like I need to add more details, more details. Each one of these stories is either a near miss or an injury that actually happened to me. Almost all of them happened many years ago, so I'm much better now than I used to be. I've learned, I've learned my lessons, which is part of this talk. So I'll just jump into the first talk.

 And as was mentioned, one of my duties is to sample for asbestos. So this was back in the 1980s so I got a call, and there wasn’t email or text or, you know, ticket systems, you got a phone call from somebody who described what they wanted you to do, and you would go do it. So I got a call from somebody in what was called the Office of Design and Construction, and it's now called Office of Capital Planning. But anyway, they were going to be renovating Dial Lodge. And Dial Lodge was an eating club at the time, but this had changed hands and was now a university property, and it was going to be renovated to be an academic building. So I got the van and I got my tool bag, and I came over and I found a place to park, and I walked into the building, and I was told that they were going to be renovating a space, which is what was like a bar area where they had their parties and stuff. So the eating clubs are basically the social gathering places for juniors and seniors and where they have their meals. They don't eat in the regular dining halls, like the freshmen, first years and sophomores, and they're private, basically private clubs. And so I was kind of excited, because I'd never been in one, because they weren't something that you went in, and I had already been in a lot of the buildings on campus at the time. So they were going to renovate this space and take up some floor tile and fix the floor and remove the whole bar. And in another area, they were going to be doing some heating and ventilation work, so there was going to be piping involved. And so they asked me to take a look around and sample what I thought might be suspect. So I get over there, and I start walking around, and I find which was an access panel to this crawl space, and it was, you know, only about this big, and it was about that high off the ground. 

So I didn't have a ladder, and so I used a chair, and I got up on this chair with my flashlight, and I'm peering in to this opening and checking out the piping. I see mostly fiberglass piping or uninsulated piping. I didn't see anything of concern, so I didn't feel the need to actually get in the crawl space, and then I would have gone for a ladder if I needed to get actually in there. So I get down off the chair. There were no wheels on the chair. I get down off the chair, and I walk around the corner to the other room where the bar had been. And it was just such a neat experience, because I was standing there thinking to myself, all the parties and all the activities that went on in this room. And it was a dump. It was like, filthy dirty. It was beat up, and the furniture had kids initials all engraved in it. But it was, you know, iconic. I mean, it was like, that was the thing. But I just stood there for a few minutes just basking in the glow of all that history and how many things had happened in there. And then I got back to work. 

So the floor was obviously tile that would be of concern. So it was white and black checkerboard pattern. So I took samples of the tile and the mastic, and there was some cove base [tile] work there, so I took another bit of glue from there, and I really didn't see anything else that was of concern. So I filled out my paperwork, and then I packed my bag all up, and I was leaving the building, and I turned around and I walked around the corner. And as I got around the corner, I looked up where that access panel was—there was no door on it, it was just open—and inside of that panel was the biggest rat I had ever seen in my entire life. 

And I could not believe it was like sitting in the opening taking up like half of the opening. He was sitting in there, and this chill just went up my back, and I was like, Oh my gosh, my face was just in that opening. I was just leaning in there looking, and my hand, and what if I’d scared him? And I was really creeped out, which takes a bit so and then I got angry. I really got angry, because the guy that sent me over there, I'm like, What is he doing, sending me here for this? So I go back to the office, and I called him up, and I says, what's up with the rat? And he's like, oh, whoa, we heard about that. He says, I think that rat's been there for a long time. He says, I've heard stories that runs between the eating clubs, which were meant to be dining facilities, he says, and I think it's just been in there for a very, very long time. 

I said, well, thanks for warning me! You know you send me out on this job to look at this, and you don't even tell me anything is that's that could be going on there. I said, I don't know you better not be calling me anymore. 

So that's that story. But I thought what I would do was that I would just ask the audience, now after each story, to just give me a couple of points where that could have been better, that scenario could have been improved, either on my part or someone else's part, so that the risk wasn't there. What I'd like to do is do the four stories and then see if there's commonalities in the stories for what can create more risky situations or hazards, because I'm going old school. 

At this point, Joan threw it open to comments which were written on a whiteboard.

The rat could have been included on the original phone call.

Exactly! I could have been informed or told about this possible rat, right?

I think that's actually the point I was going to make. Is that sometimes we get called on emergencies, and we go out without asking a lot of questions, and then we get there and we try to start solving problems without getting some background and more information about where we're going that could have helped with that situation.

Robin's going to write for me. I'm new at this. By the way, this is the first time I've ever spoken at a symposium, and all thanks to Megan, right? I got through 37 years without doing this, and now, look what happens?

You are absolutely killing it. Joan. Just to piggyback on the last point, I think, you know, as safety professionals, when we're responding to things, you know, we preach about Job Hazard Analysis and pre planning when we do training, but I think that if we take that pause ourself, maybe we could do that more often. And in this case, maybe like doing a more formal job hazard analysis might have led to asking more questions, maybe of the project manager that could have got you to you know that information about the largest rat ever,

The largest, largest rat ever. And I actually worked in a research facility before this job, and they worked with rats, they were nowhere near this big. Yes, could have been a raccoon. 

So Joan the theme of safety, talked about comparing the chair to a ladder. Was the crawl space, actually a confined space as well? 

Could have been. It could have been, didn't ask that question I didn't ask.

So using a ladder, right? Yeah, I'm guilty of the same thing I'm going to confess. You know, I'm the, you know, I know about safety, and do I practice safety 100% all the time, even though I know better, right? I know for a certainty, once in my life, I think I've used a chair with or without wheels instead of a ladder. So, yeah, absolutely.

I debated. I really debated on putting that in here or not. And, and, you know, what do they call that, poetic license? Like I would have changed it to a little step stool. Matter of fact, I think in my written version, it says a little step stool. The I thought no, these people know you, Joan,

I won't ask anybody who's never done that to please stand up.

We're always finding ourselves working alone.

13:53

Story Two: Stuck in Spelman

Oh, I got a better one coming up for that. But hold that. Hold that thought you're gonna love my third story, so I'm gonna jump into the second story, which was my second story. Oh no, it is my second story. It's my second story. 

Okay, so similar situation. I get called, and we were still out on Forrestal campus at the time. Not that that really matters, but it's a detail that adds, you know, 15 seconds to my talk. So I'm just putting it out here. I don't know how to do it any other way, Steve. Honestly. Anyway, so I get a call again. This was from a facilities person in the plumbing shop, like the supervisor of the plumbing shop, and it was a pipe, it was a steam line, and it was leaking, and so they wanted to repair it, and it most likely had asbestos insulation on it, because it was a steam line, but I would go sample it anyway. So I get told, and I did. 

They did tell me that the steam line had been shut down, so wouldn't be super hot, but that it would be hot. So they gave me that warning at least before I left. And so I went over again in the van, which drove like a tank. And I get there, and they describe the fact—so this was in what's called Spelman dorms, and there's about eight different attached buildings. They each have their own entryways. And he said it was in the back of entry four. And so I parked, you know, and I want, I had to walk around the outside of the building and get around the other side of it, and Spelman dorm has these like overhangs, so there's part of the building that's hanging over, and underneath there are access panels to mechanical spaces. They've since changed this. I did try to take some pictures, and I was gonna put pictures up and whatnot, but everything's changed so much since then that I really couldn't get any pictures that were like it was at the time. 

But I did find the access panel and but they have, they've actually made man doors now to get to some of these spaces, because it wasn't a good situation. But so I get under there at the time, and I was much younger and in better shape, and I had to crab walk like crab walk underneath this cement overhang, and then I get to the building wall, and I have to take off this panel, and I look in, and there's the mechanical space down there, and it's like it's a little bit of a drop. But I didn't think anything of it. And I saw, I took my toolbox and I dropped it into the mechanical space, and then I proceeded. 

The bottom of the mechanical the access panel opening was almost on the ground, so I was able to turn around and push my way in backwards. So I went in feet first. Went in feet first, and then I went to the edge, and then I dropped down into the space, turned around, picked up my toolbox, started looking around to try to find the pipe. And I'm looking around, and the steam that had been leaking had made it was just such a really cool site. I'm with my flashlight, all the cobwebs and spider webs in this space were glistening. It was just, it was magical. It was so much fun. And I just stood there looking at all these cobwebs and out so spiders don't really bother me, right? And so I just enjoyed the look of it. It was really pretty cool. The rest of the mechanical space was a dump, right? It was mildewy. It was classic dank and all that. So I found a stick so that I could move the cobwebs away from where I needed to go. And I walked around and I found where the pipe had been leaking. I collect the sample, I bag it up, I write out the paperwork. Start to pack up my stuff, I turn around to leave, put my tool, tools away, and I'm about to get out and the access opening, the bottom of the panel opening is here. It's about here.

Joan indicates a height pretty far above her head.

I don't have a chair right. So now again, I was younger and stronger back then, but I was not strong enough to lift my push my weight up to get out of here. So I stood back and went, huh? Oh, yeah, you know, shucks, what did I do? Yes, no phone. Cell phones weren't even thought of yet. There was I had no phone. I had no radio. There was certainly no landline, and nobody knew where I had gone. The supervisor of the plumbing shop knew I was going to sample, but he had no idea when, because I just said, Yeah, I'll get to it today or tomorrow. So I stood there for a good few minutes, and then I started to look around, and there's no chair, no ladder, no step stool, no rocks. I started looking for rocks, thinking I could step on a rock. Then I stood there and started to wonder how long it was going to take before I would start yelling for help. And I'm really stubborn, you know, I don't want to yell for help. And it took me a few minutes, and then finally I realized my toolbox was metal, and my toolbox was about this high, so I was able to put my toolbox down and step up on it. And that got the ledge to about here, and I was able to jump up and hoist myself out, crawl onto the ground. Then I went to the plumbing shop and get the guy that sent me out there to come back with the ladder so he could put me back down in the hole, so I could get my toolbox and go back to the office. So what might I have done wrong?

Yes, so there's no no judgment, but there's no accountability system for personnel in that story. You didn't check out. You didn't tell anybody where you were going. You didn't tell anybody that you were there. There was no process for working alone. There was no process for making sure people knew where you were, and there was no process for accounting for the rat, which I'm really surprised you didn't take an assessment of before you went in considering story number one.

Exactly. Yeah, I didn't see any rats in this one, but good point. There could have been a rat, but I'm ready. I know they're coming.

I think we now need a symposium call Joan’s stories.

I have more. I really, really do.

I think similar to story number one, is you asking questions about the space and the configuration of the space and how deep is it? Do I need a ladder? What's it take to access. Right, finding that all that information out. Yep, ask more questions. Definitely.

I know the spiders want a big thing for you, but I mean, there could be some very dangerous spiders. I mean, it could have no I mean, do we not have to worry about dangerous spiders in New Jersey? Brown recluse, right? I'm a little unsettled by the whole spider thing, and not that necessarily, that information needs to be provided in advance, but maybe it would have been nice to know if they knew, or either warn you know, because, yay, there was a stick. What if their hadn’t been a stick? I mean, blech.

I was pretty pleased that they told me it was hot and to be careful that it was hot at the time. 

Yeah, you knew about that hazard.

Yes, but remember this, this was also, again, probably in the late ‘80s, so this was old, and we do things better now. But okay, thank you.

Yeah, and um, only because I've done this myself: you shouldn't go into a space unless you know how you're gonna get out. 

There's that, yes, young and dumb.

I also think the concept of communication like a way of communicating with people, like, when you're in a situation like that, so in that case, maybe there were radios at the time that you could have brought with you, but or just knowing, like, when communication isn't available. So like, if you're going into a space and it's just the dead zone, right? And you there's no way that if you get into a predicament, that someone will come and rescue you? 

Oh, exactly for sure. Or somebody should have at least known I was there, or been there with me or something. It's amazing how many things I went and did on my own alone.

You kind of just said what I was thinking. But just knowing how we're set up here, maybe having that person from the plumbing shop meet you there and accompany you and show you exactly you know where you know they take for granted that you know everything.

Actually, that's usually how it works now, yeah, come with me. Yeah. I think somebody told them don't let Joan go on her own, I think they said, make sure you go with her,

High hazard areas without permanent fixture lighting, because light bulbs and flashlights back then didn't exactly do nice on batteries.

Well, there was real lighting in the space. I don't remember how it was on, but it was on like, I don't know whether it was on all the time, but I do remember that wasn't great. 

But when did you need the flashlight then? 

Because it wasn't very good lighting, and I needed to actually look for the leak, yeah, but I'm pretty sure there was some light on in there could be wrong. 

Out of curiosity, how long would it have taken for somebody to find you if you did have to holler for help?

Well, seeing as it was a dorm and it was solid concrete, I don't know, and it was early part of the day, it might have been like in the evening when people started coming back from classes. This is a really good question.

So I know things are different now, and I know that we would never build that way again, but the idea of putting something that someone's going to have to access in a crawl space in behind a little tiny access panel, so it's a thing that I call design for maintenance, and so just make a plan for people to get into that space and fix that thing that's going to break. The engineers will tell you that that's never going to break, and no one's ever going to have to get in there. And that's just they're just wrong. 

And we still find that happening with all kinds of equipment that's up in the ceiling and nobody can reach it.

We'll talk about that tomorrow, but you have to be vigilant.

We got it's really what? Lone worker and communication, right? So we didn't have these bricks, right? But, like a, I don't know if a walkie talkie would have worked down there or something like that, but even then. So, you know, we used to design check ins, if I don't hear from you in X minutes, I'm going to send someone, right? So that sort of which we have that you know today, including in labs with researchers working at all sorts of different hours, right? Yeah, yeah, great.

We instilled in our in our Tiger Safe App that you saw earlier, the working alone app, part of it, so that you can do that. 

So you said, when you approached the hole that you had no idea how far down it was going to be.

I knew it was, it wasn't real far. It was, it was little far. Yeah, it was about this big. 

So would it have been helpful if there was some kind of signage or marking to indicate, you know, just how far down you had to go, you know, five foot drop. 

Yes, no, hey there could have been a sign of some sort that said, this is a drop. Yeah, that could have been helpful. Yeah, Joan, don't drop in here. Thank you. That was great. So that was that one. 

27:25

Story Three: The Smoking Drum

So this next one another part of one of my jobs, and this one I don't do all the time. This one's only like, if we're short handed, is to help with the hazardous waste program. So we had a Facilities—again, those Facilities, people, they start all this stuff, now that I think about it. They they were doing, which was a really good initiative. They were trying to clean out the mechanical spaces in some of the buildings, in all the buildings, well, as many as they could anyway. So they did a push, and they do this every few years or so, to walk the mechanical spaces and make a push to get things cleaned out. And we got a call from somebody about this was in Forbes, which is another dormitory and dining facility, that there was a 55 gallon drum of something, and they wanted it to go away. They wanted to get it out of there. 

So we went up and looked at this drum, and it was had been in the mechanical space probably for quite a while. The labeling was little bit of obscure, you know, it was smudged, if I remember correctly. Part of the label was ripped. But after and it took a little while of calling people and researching, and we talked to our campus engineering department, the energy people, as to what this material could be, and we narrowed it down. 

The building itself was not part of the whole the university's main steam system. It had its own separate boiler, so they would have this water treatment chemical to de-scale the boilers. And we'd determined that this was what the material was. We were able to get that information from different people, and by partially getting information off of the label, we determined that it was a material called Burnout. Note on that right? And it was a concentrated hydrochloric acid solution. 

So we're like, well, that's fine. We know what it is, now we can get it out of here. So we called our hazardous waste company, and the vendors came, and I escorted them down into this mechanical room. Wasn't alone this time, and the vendor proceeded to take the drum and move it, and we had to get it out of the I think, I don't know maybe you remember Steve, we had to go up one or two steps, I think, out of the mechanical room, to get it on the same level as the elevator was right? 

So he had to pull it up, yeah, with a dolly, up a couple of steps. Wasn't far, and we put it in, we put it in an elevator, and he and I got on the elevator. I love the groans. We got on the elevator, us two and the drum. And luckily, we only had to go one floor, because as we're riding up the elevator, it started to fume. The 55 gallon drum started to fume. And we're like waiting for the doors to open. The Hazardous Waste vendor, the young guy. And he was pretty young. He was kind of behind the drum, but as soon as those doors opened, he was on the other side of the drum. I think he vaulted over it. And I at first being a little slow sometimes. I was like, you know, and so we get out of there, and we watched it fume for a little bit, but it stopped pretty quickly, you know. So that was a really good thing. 

We realized that the bung was a little bit loose, and so we tightened the bung, and he cleaned off the top of the drum, and we got it out of the building. And then it was a process of trying to figure out what happened. And to the best we could figure is either someone had put some pump oil from the mechanical room into this drum with the acid, and then the jostling of it from moving it caused it to fume, or there were smudge, you know, just oil residue on the drum itself, and the spitting of the acidity solution caused it to fume as we moved it upstairs, but once we closed it up and in, it stopped fuming. The waste company did take it away. They moved the drum out, and there was a little burn mark on the carpet. Then we had to get that piece of carpet replaced too. 

So I know one of the things I did wrong, but go ahead, you could tell me. It. Okay, good. We all know what I did wrong. Never get on an elevator with a drum. But the one other thing I wanted to mention, if we didn't, is, because I'm going to try to tie all these together, is, you know, labeling, and if someone had put something in that drum, that they certainly should have written it onto the a label or added it to the drum. So just to give that information, would have been really helpful.

Were you absolutely necessary in the mechanical room, or were you in a sort of a witness accessory to the actual event? I'm asking because we hire contractors for a purpose, and it's to do the work that we don't want to do or that we're not equipped to do, and then are we necessary in that moment.

Only initially, to show him where he had to go, I was really more or less just giving him access and showing him where he had to go.

So you could have, no judgment, one could have said, Jeff, there's the drum and there's the elevator, I'll meet you at the dock. Yes. And then Jeff would have had his moment, but it wouldn't have been your moment. 

Yeah, yeah. But you know, maybe—I like to talk to people, so. It's a flaw.

I do have a comment, though, about the elevator, so I think it's, it's, you know, you don't have to argue that you shouldn't get into the elevator. But then, how do you manage that process? Right? Because a lot of people were like, oh, obviously, put it in, push the button, meet it somewhere. Well, what happens when someone meets it at a floor in between, you know? And so I think a lot of times it's easy for us in our SOPs to say, hey, send it up alone, you know. But then what happens like, Are people smart enough not to get into an elevator with hazardous things? And oftentimes the answer is no, and sometimes even when there's a big sign across the elevator. So thinking about that too.

Yeah, you certainly have to think through that a little bit. And if you had to go more than one floor, have a person on each floor, somebody's got to run up each one.

So how carefully did you look at the condition of the drum before trying to transport it? 

We looked at it carefully enough to realize. It wasn't dented or rusted or corroded, but the waste vendor should have made sure that that bung was tighter than it was, and then it might not have, of course, then it might have poofed up and been worse if it hadn't had a vent.

Joan, my question was, was it just a dolly that you had the drum on? Or was it an actual, like, stair stepping Dolly for drums?

I don't really remember, but I think it was probably just a dolly. Yeah.

Okay, well, technically, we're at five minutes until the Q and A.

35:42

Story Four: The Booby-Trapped Fume Hood

Oh yeah, we've done our Q and A. This is my last story, and this one, unfortunately involves an injury, and you guessed it—to me. So this was another one of my jobs, a different job, and it was to do fume hood evaluations. I do them every year on every single hood on campus, and we now have 728 of them on campus. And that's just one of the things that I do. Of course, this was again, back a ways. And so at that time, I had a cart and a laptop and a printer that I would print up labels and I would write down, well, the laptop, I would record the data, so I had this big setup with me, and I would drag that with me wherever I went. 

So I was on my way around one of the science and engineering buildings. This is the molecular biology building, and I was proceeding to start to do the evaluation on one of the hoods in a lab. And this lab actually had used radioactive materials. It was one of our radioactive use labs. They generally used P 32 and so when I approached the hood, it had its radioactive use lab sign on it, its label, which was great, and I would make note of that, so that our rad safety officer, well actually, I would make note if I see things labeled for radioactive use in a hood that didn't have one of those stickers, but this one had the sticker, so it was fine.

I went to take the readings, and so these were all constant volume hoods, and at that time you would open a hood sash, maybe 30 inches. If it didn't stop or alarm, it got opened as far as it would go before I took measurements. That's just to let you know, we really opened sashes pretty far back then. And so I opened the sash, and as it went up through the top of the hood, it hit something on the top of the hood, and it knocked it off onto my face. And it was hard and it hurt a lot. No, it was not a dog sized rat. It was not soft at all. It was very hard and had really pointy edges. So it hurt a lot, you know, my nose, so it actually hit my safety glasses and cut the bridge of my nose. I know that's yeah, so don't worry. I was wearing my safety glasses. It cut the bridge of my nose, so I knew my nose was bleeding now, and there was nobody in the lab. Again, I'm by myself. Nobody around. 

So I grab a paper towel, and I'm like, wow, this is really bleeding. So I left the lab, I walked out, and I walked the block up to the McCosh Health Center, and I walked in and said, a thing fell on my face. I'm bleeding. Little did I know? So they take me in employee health, they take me in and they clean it up and stop the bleeding, and they make me go down to get X rays. And sure enough, I'd broken my nose and so, and it didn't need to be straightened or anything. That was fine, but they thought they were going to have to give me stitches. And so I was like, okay. 

Meanwhile, come to find out. I found this out later, but meanwhile, my office was in, well, uproar is not quite the right word, but they were really worried because I left the radioactive use lab, and the reason they knew this is because my cart was left there, and some one of the lab members came back and said, Oh, what's this cart doing here? And figured out it was mine, because I've been there every year for years. And so they called my office to find out why my cart was there. And they're like, well, we don't know where's Joan? 

So they tracked it down somehow, but they found out that this apparatus was an electrophoresis chamber, which could have it had to do with something that they would use the the markers, right, the radioactive tagged markers and DNA chains or whatever they used it for. And so it possibly could have been contaminated with radioactive material, and here I am walking out of the lab and up the street and into the other building. So they were a little upset, but it turns out they called employee health, and they were wearing their lab coats and gloves anyway, so there wasn't as much of a concern for their exposure. And they figured they would survey me when I got done getting my stitches. 

So then they said that Dr Wright was going to put these stitches in my nose. Okay, fine. So I get four stitches in my nose, and then I get everything squared away and leave. I go back to the office, and they're surveying me, and they're like, Wow, who put the stitches in? I said, Dr. Wright. They went. Dr. Wright, you let him put stitches in your nose? Dr. Wright was kind of like an absent minded Professor kind of doctor. He was an older doctor, and he was very forgetful, and he would show up to meetings and forget the notes that he wanted to give out, or he had an assistant that would make sure he got to the right place at the right time. And so they're like, I can't believe you let him touch your face. 

Like, well, you know what? He had two modes. He had regular mode and Doctor mode. And when he was in Doctor mode he was on, because he was yelling at his staff. Can't you see, I'm doing a face. I need smaller sutures. He goes. And so I've been happy with the work that he did, you know, but so that's, that's the story for how I had another set of stitches in my nose. 

So what? What was wrong with this scenario? Enlighten me.

So Joan, I have a question. This is related to like office procedure—is our wipe off board there because of you?

Yes.

So I think there's a theme here with these four stories that might be worth highlighting. And it's the whole working alone thing, and it's something that we train on. And I think, like, like, the take home for me is to really emphasize this more in training, you know, when we're communicating this out across the board? Because, you know, there's a thread here where, if you weren't alone, maybe the outcome, or at least with the last one, with the injury, might not have been as severe, or you know that the situation wouldn't have happened in the first place. Who knows? But there's definitely a theme here that I think is worth. Is worth maybe the take home message to emphasize out to our campus communities.

Yes, the Joan Hutzly work alone. There you go. We have that app because of me too.

So I'm a one person EHS shop. So as I'm listening to all your stories, I'm thinking, Hmm, how many times have I gone out to campus, into a mechanical room with nobody else, or just another space? So I'm thinking, How do I need to change my practices to keep me safe? And so I'm curious. I know I have some fellow EHS that are just one person shops here. So what do you do?

So not to judge in any way, but I sense a little bit of complacency. You've been in these labs year after year, and so you don't expect there to be anything on top of the hood. You didn't look just around that might be hazardous.

I do now. All this time later, and I still look up before I open the sash of a hood

To respond to Carol, now that I have staff I bring with me everywhere talk to. It's great. But until two years ago, you know, I leave laboratory doors open. I probably I bring a proper tool with me. I do anything to basically show Hey, I'm here, even mechanical rooms and whatnot. Turn lights on. I sometimes I do call Campus Security and I say, hey, just so you know, I am going to be here, and there could be something wrong with the space. If you don't hear from me, come get me.

Not to that specific story, but the conversation we're having about working alone, we've had a couple incidents recently that just reminded me that we in training, in particular, need to emphasize that if someone's injured, that they may need an escort to get emergency help. We had a confusing case where someone had some hearing disability, and were they were sent somewhere, and they didn't understand what was happening, and they sent him somewhere else, and he had a fairly serious injury, and went back and forth between these offices. And I think if someone had been able to communicate for him, it would have been easier. And then we had another situation where someone really could have passed out on the way to Student Health, and they didn't have an escort. So just keeping that in mind that when you're alone, you're also trying to get emergency help where you may be confused and need help with that 

Certainly, yep, for sure.

So one of the themes I'm seeing here is is the underscoring value of communication, effective communication. And I am recognizing in my own office that I implemented the sign out board after my experience of working here, we all have little whiteboards at our offices to indicate where we are if we go out. But in the day of cell phones and everything else, quite frankly, we're kind of complacent about it. We don't we aren't as vigilant about it, because, well, I can just call somebody probably, or text somebody, or what have you. 

So I am sitting here recognizing the generosity that of you sharing these stories with us today is incredibly generous of you, putting yourself up there, sharing being so vulnerable, because we're now going to take away sort of a renewed vigilance on all the things that. We are being complacent about and communication and working alone are obviously huge. So thank you for taking the time to share and being so vulnerable with us and your generosity and sharing your stories.

You've really done an amazing job. Thanks. 

Wrap-Up

Okay, so what are our main takeaways here? 

Ask more questions. Get as much information as you can before going to a job. This way you'll know what you need and how best to prepare do a job site analysis. A job site analysis is an on site evaluation that analyzes the situational demands made on an employee and the physical activities required to perform a job. 

Task hazard assessment, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration identifies failure to do a hazard assessment is one of the root causes of workplace injuries, illnesses and incidents. A hazard assessment involves collecting information about the hazards present, conducting periodic inspections, evaluating injuries and near misses associated with a given space or situation, and considering hazards that could arise from an emergency or non routine situation. 

Effective communication. Have systems in place to identify the location of employees and reach parties quickly, if needed. Even in the age of cell phones, having procedures in place and important information readily at hand is essential in crisis situations. 

And above all, avoid working alone. This is the single greatest risk factor running through all of Joan's stories you've been listening to.

Thanks for listening to EHS stories. You can find us on iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud, Spotify and other streaming platforms, as well as on our anniversary website, 50 years.ehs.princeton.edu. Look for the podcast link on the main menu bar. There you will find a media player, a transcript of this episode and more. You will also find information and resources related to the 50th anniversary of the Princeton University Office of Environmental Health and Safety. 

EHS Stories is a production of the Princeton University Office of Environmental Health and Safety. This show was produced, written, edited and narrated by me. Jim Sturdivant. The music was written and recorded by me also. Our logo was designed by Chelsea McDonnell. 

Thanks to CSHEMA, the Campus Safety, Health and Environmental Management Association, for sharing the audio file with me, which was edited slightly for length and clarity. More information on CSHEMA is available at cshema.org—that's C, S, H, E, M, A DOT-ORG. The views expressed here do not reflect nor do they represent Princeton University, or the Princeton University Office of Environmental Health and Safety. Thanks again for listening and join us for the next episode of EHS Stories coming soon to your favorite podcast platform.