<p>What a horrific tragedy. This doesn’t sound like a lab accident, rather a machine shop accident. Odd to me that the shop was open in the middle of the night, and she was working (speculating here) alone. Normally, shops in university settings are run by professional managers who are full time faculty with extensive experience in manufacturing using lathes and other dangerous equipment. Even with training, few students have the experience and training to run this type of machinery independently. Because of this, shops are usually open only during the day and the use of equipment is very limited and always under some supervision.</p>
<p>Joblue:
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<p>The logic is that at the public community college you are like an uninsured person while at an institute like Yale a student should be like having a comprehensive insurance. The institute like Yale is suppose to be responsible for the well being of student while at community college a student might even be responsible for community college equipment damages.</p>
<p>I teach engineering in a shop/lab room. Statistically, most accident victims in the shop are “seasoned” students. Newbies have an inherent, healthy level of fear that keeps them safe. They’re very aware of where their fingers are and often police each other when it comes to safety rules. </p>
<p>Older and more experienced students feel much more comfortable and tend to lose sight of those basic safety procedures. In 100% of cases, it’s a lapse in judgement that leads to an accident.</p>
<p>I have merged two related threads and apologize if there is a bit of a disconnect in the order of some posts.</p>
<p>I agree with Joblue, you can be brilliant and be an utter moron about practical things at the same time. Think of the stereotypical absent minded professor, crossing the street while reading a book.</p>
<p>Several years ago, a woman was strangled when her scarf got caught in the handrail of a Metro escalator. It happened very quickly, before anyone could free her. Be careful around machinery people, especially with anything around your neck (ties, scarves, necklaces, hair)!!</p>
<p>My old HS way back in the day required all male students–even the college prep track- to take a semester of shop where you learned to operate all basic power tools safely and properly. One of the more useful classes I have taken at any school. I was not very good at it but at least I learned how dangerous saws, planers, presses, and lathes could be.</p>
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<p>I was wondering about this, too. The article states it happened in a chemistry lab. Apparently, there is a machine shop associated with the department:</p>
<p>[Facilities:</a> Yale Department of Chemistry](<a href=“http://www.chem.yale.edu/res/facilities.html]Facilities:”>http://www.chem.yale.edu/res/facilities.html)</p>
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<p>Maybe I’m not coming across properly. It would have been a tragic incident irrespective of where it would have happened.</p>
<p>Does that mean my reaction would have been similar? No.
There are lots of reason for that but the main thing might be that in my mind I would have assumed that community college might not have all the prescribed safeties in place, the student might not have gone thru the safety classes because of lacks of funds etc…
It would never have occured to me that this can also happen at DD’s college.</p>
<p>Since it happened at Yale, the first thing that came to my mind that it could happen at DD’s college. I was not prepared for that. I never thought such incident can happen at HMSPY. This is the third time an incident at Yale have prompted strong reaction becuase I think if it can happen at Yale it can at DD’s college too. So I was totally taken off guard and hence the reaction.</p>
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<p>A snob by any other name is still a snob.</p>
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<p>You could easily make the opposite argument. Many CCs train students in the industrial sciences and manufacturing tech, and therefore have excellent machine shop facilities and programs. At Yale, the shop was secondary, that is, it is simply a tool used by students doing other work. Perhaps the high intellectual mean of the students at Yale gave a false sense of confidence that they understood the safety precautions, while at a CC, they would be less likely to take safety for granted.</p>
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<p>But that makes no sense, POIH. The facilities at Nowheresville CC may not be as grand or as posh at that at Yale, but they would still be expected to follow the appropriate safety protocols. For the life of me, I don’t know why you would expect the risk management people at either place to be appreciably different in terms of their outlook.</p>
<p>Both WalMart and N-M are responsible for providing a safe environment for their employees (in terms of loading / unloading merchandise, not requiring people to climb ladders without the appropriate safety precautions, etc.). The fact that N-M is a posher store is irrelevant.</p>
<p>You also have a very odd view of comm college. You seem to think the kids who are there must be one step above ■■■■■■■■ such that they wouldn’t possibly understand safety precautions. You seem to be completely oblivious to the fact that there are plenty of smart people who are in comm colleges for a multitude of reasons, and it doesn’t make them blithering idiots who can’t find their behinds with two hands.</p>
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<p>Why not?
HEAVEN FORBID, of course … but why couldn’t the school shootings that happened at Va Tech / NIU happen at HYPSM? Anything can happen anywhere. HYPSM is not some magic bubble. Why do you think it is?</p>
<p>i’m still stuck on the issue mentioned by bunsen about having trade professionals do certain skilled work for research purposes, as usually happens in industry. this goes for work like glass blowing, electronic assemblage (except i suppose in the ee department), operation of sophisticated analytic instrumentation, etc. this is done not only because of extensive training and practice required for consistent results, but also to minimize the chance accident that results either in damage to equipment, or injury, or as at yale - tragedy. was the policy of having students do their own work in the machine shop due to an effort to enrich the research experience of undergrad chemists, or to reduce department staff costs? just asking.</p>
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POIH - you just keep digging the hole deeper. Of course it could happen at your D’s school if it has the same equipment and the students use the equipment. Believe it or not even HYPSM students can get complacent, tired, careless, or otherwise do stupid things. </p>
<p>I’ve used a lot of power tools and equipment and it takes only a split second of inattentiveness to result it bodily injury. It’s inherent in the equipment whether it be lathes, saws, chemicals, radioactive materials, electricity, heavy equipment, or any of a multitude of other devices.</p>
<p>As long as Yale, or MIT, or the local CC allows students to use this kind of equipment and materials, the risk of something happening is always there. The lather itself doesn’t know or care whether it’s a Yale, your D’s school, at the local CC, or in my garage - it represents the same inherent danger regardless. </p>
<p>I don’t know the details of course, but most likely this student could have taught a course in safety prior to this accident. It doesn’t matter how much one is taught, how much they know, or how many signs are placed on the equipment, if the operator fails to follow all of the procedures and be cautious it takes only one slip-up, a split second, for serious consequences to result.</p>
<p>You’re being very naive to think something like this could happen readily at a CC but not at Yale or whatever school your D is attending. It makes no difference whatsoever what the school is. </p>
<p>The bottom line is that a young person lost her life due to a tragic accident. That’s what’s important - not what school it happened to take place at.</p>
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<p>That is an understatement. This is a tragic accident. My heart goes out to the family and friends of this young woman.</p>
<p>Students are encouraged to do their own work in the machine shop to gain a deep understanding of all elements of the process. From the article I read, the student at Yale was developing a tool or jig for use in an experiment for her senior project. Clearly, having hands-on experience would be an invaluable part of the project. Many students relish the opportunity to design and build their own projects. However, because students don’t have much experience using dangerous equipment, it should be used under the supervision of a professional shop manager, with strict safety protocols in place. It is not clear if that was the case here.</p>
<p>I agree with so much of what BunsenBurner has to offer and speculate, too.</p>
<p>What was this girl doing in a machine lab so late at night, presumably by herself? And this holds true for any male students either, working alone in a lab late at night. Bad things can happen, especially when people are burning the candles at both ends.</p>
<p>Like BB, H has been working in and around chem labs for almost 30 years. He is required to get mandatory safety training at least every year. But could I guarantee that he wouldn’t get distracted by something, loose a train of thought and do something stupid? No… if anything, sometimes I joke and wonder how his lab is still standing as he seems so oblivious to things at home. He seems to think those things will never happen to him. </p>
<p>I remember, also, when he was working in the lab for six years during his Ph.D. and post-doc, that he never had a pair of jeans that didn’t have holes and/or stains in them right around the upper thigh area because he never, ever wore a lab coat (even though it was required - no one did) and any time he leaned across a bench to reach for something, he’d inevitably get something on his jeans that would eat through it. I agree with the speculation that those who have spent more time in labs become less sensitized to the dangers, whereas newbies are more aware.</p>
<p>Regardless of whether or not it’s a CC or Ivy (or major pharma), unless you are able to assign a safety director to each student/employee, accidents will happen. And they are always tragic.</p>
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That is a bad assumption to make.</p>
<p>POIH, Will Rogers said “When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.”</p>
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It was the early '80’s, and no, there were no signs near the dangerous machines. We were warned by the girls who trained us, accompanied by horror stories of cases where people had failed to heed the warnings.</p>
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That’s exactly the sort of mindset that leads to more accidents (“it can’t happen here” – or “it can’t happen to me”). Certainly it it is the thinking behind the many tragic alcohol related deaths that happen regularly at college campuses-- the student with the idea that he is smarter and more sophisticated and therefore able to better judge his capacity for alcohol intake. (We had a very tragic illustration of that a few years ago on CC with a Cornell student who was fond of posting boastful comments about his drinking prowess and superior ability to know what was “safe”… until he managed to drink himself to death and posted here no more.)</p>
<p>When a parent or student is thinking “it can’t happen at X” because X is a better, safer school or because the students at X are so much smarter than average – they are engaging in a thought process that opens the door to more accidents, because they are in denial rather than being proactive about safety. </p>
<p>I suppose some people really need to have an incident that strikes close to home to shock them out of complacency. But my point is simply that terrible accidents often happen because the person thinks of them as something that happens to someone else – or because they think things will be o.k. if they skip some safety step “just this once”, or get the idea that the safety rules are just implemented by over-cautious administrators afraid of lawsuits and can safely be disregarded by others.</p>