ASP Incident Investigation and Analysis 5 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: OSHA's incident investigation standard primarily requires employers to investigate incidents to:
- Assign disciplinary action to responsible workers
- Determine causes and prevent recurrence (Correct answer)
- Satisfy insurance carrier requirements
- Document liability for legal proceedings
Correct answer: Determine causes and prevent recurrence
OSHA expects investigations to identify root and contributing causes so effective corrective actions can be implemented to prevent recurrence.
Question 2: A 'Management Oversight and Risk Tree' (MORT) analysis specifically evaluates:
- Ergonomic stressors and cumulative trauma disorders
- Oversights and omissions in management systems that contributed to an incident (Correct answer)
- Environmental impact of industrial incidents
- Worker compensation cost drivers
Correct answer: Oversights and omissions in management systems that contributed to an incident
MORT is a systematic technique that analyzes management system failures and omissions to identify how organizational factors contributed to an incident.
Question 3: Which corrective action hierarchy provides the greatest long-term reliability after an incident?
- Retraining involved workers
- Adding warning signs at the hazard location
- Eliminating or substituting the hazard source (Correct answer)
- Issuing updated written procedures
Correct answer: Eliminating or substituting the hazard source
Elimination and substitution are at the top of the hierarchy of controls and provide the most reliable, permanent reduction of risk.
Question 4: An investigator identifies that a pressure relief valve was last inspected 4 years beyond its required interval. This finding is best classified as:
- An immediate cause
- A root cause related to management system failure (Correct answer)
- A contributing factor related to worker error
- An environmental factor
Correct answer: A root cause related to management system failure
Missed inspection intervals reflect a breakdown in the maintenance management system, qualifying as a root cause tied to organizational processes.
Question 5: In a 5-Why analysis, investigators should stop asking 'Why?' when they reach:
- The first human error identified
- A factor outside the organization's control
- A root cause amenable to corrective action (Correct answer)
- Five iterations regardless of findings
Correct answer: A root cause amenable to corrective action
The 5-Why technique aims to reach a root cause where a corrective action can be applied; stopping arbitrarily at five or at human error misses the method's purpose.
Question 6: Which metric best measures the effectiveness of corrective actions implemented after incident investigations?
- Total number of investigations completed per year
- Recurrence rate of similar incidents after corrective action (Correct answer)
- Percentage of incidents with four or more root causes
- Workers' compensation cost reduction
Correct answer: Recurrence rate of similar incidents after corrective action
Tracking whether similar incidents recur after corrective actions directly measures whether the investigation's recommendations actually prevented recurrence.
Question 7: An energy trace and barrier analysis (ETBA) conducted post-incident would focus on identifying:
- The financial cost of damaged equipment
- Which energy sources were released and what barriers failed (Correct answer)
- Whether workers followed lockout/tagout procedures
- Regulatory citations applicable to the event
Correct answer: Which energy sources were released and what barriers failed
ETBA examines the types of energy involved in an incident and systematically evaluates which barriers were absent, inadequate, or bypassed.
ASP Incident Investigation and Analysis 5
OSHA's incident investigation standard primarily requires employers to investigate incidents to: