Electrical Injury Drills: Approaches, Information, and Best Practices

Occupational electrical injuries are low-frequency/high-consequence events. For an industrial facility's electrical safety resource, this means that the facility's emergency response team (ERT) may never have responded to an electrical injury case. If an electrical incident did occur, however, an electrical injury is more likely to be fatal than most other types of occupational injuries. This highlights the need for facilities to have a specific electrical emergency response plan in place to ensure that timely and appropriate actions are taken if an incident occurs. Conducting periodic electrical injury drills will test a facility's emergency readiness and identify learning and growth opportunities. When planning an electrical injury drill, the scenario and type of drills will vary depending on the type and frequency of electrical activities performed at the site, ERT training, and facility resources. Using data and observations from emergency drills conducted at different industrial sites, this article examines a variety of approaches to electrical injury drills and the information and best practices that resulted.