CSS Accident Investigation and Analysis 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: During an accident investigation interview, which technique best encourages a witness to provide a full, unfiltered account?
- Ask leading questions to confirm what you already believe happened
- Begin with open-ended questions and allow the witness to narrate without interruption (Correct answer)
- Conduct the interview in a group setting so witnesses can corroborate each other
- Limit the interview to yes-or-no questions to prevent confusion
Correct answer: Begin with open-ended questions and allow the witness to narrate without interruption
Open-ended narrative questions reduce interviewer bias and allow witnesses to reveal details the investigator may not have anticipated.
Question 2: Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) is a technique that works:
- Bottom-up, starting from component failures to predict system outcomes
- Top-down, starting from an undesired event to identify contributing causes (Correct answer)
- Chronologically, mapping events in the order they occurred
- Statistically, using frequency data to rank hazard severity
Correct answer: Top-down, starting from an undesired event to identify contributing causes
FTA uses a top-down deductive approach, beginning with a defined undesired top event and tracing backward through logical gates to identify root causes.
Question 3: Which OSHA standard requires employers to record and report work-related fatalities, injuries, and illnesses?
- 29 CFR 1910.147
- 29 CFR 1904 (Correct answer)
- 29 CFR 1926.500
- 29 CFR 1910.119
Correct answer: 29 CFR 1904
29 CFR 1904 contains OSHA's recordkeeping requirements, including the 300 Log, 301 Incident Report, and 300A Annual Summary.
Question 4: In the context of accident investigation, 'perishable evidence' refers to:
- Documents that legally expire after a set period
- Physical or observational evidence that degrades, disappears, or changes rapidly if not collected immediately (Correct answer)
- Witness testimony that becomes inadmissible in court over time
- Chemical samples that must be laboratory-tested within 24 hours
Correct answer: Physical or observational evidence that degrades, disappears, or changes rapidly if not collected immediately
Perishable evidence such as skid marks, spilled fluids, environmental conditions, and witness memory degrades quickly and must be documented promptly.
Question 5: A supervisor who completes an incident investigation report and codes the cause only as 'employee carelessness' has most likely:
- Correctly identified the root cause in most occupational accidents
- Stopped the analysis too early and missed systemic causes (Correct answer)
- Fulfilled OSHA's root cause analysis requirements
- Applied the correct Domino Theory classification
Correct answer: Stopped the analysis too early and missed systemic causes
Attributing accidents solely to worker carelessness is a surface-level conclusion that ignores systemic failures in training, design, supervision, or procedures.
Question 6: The Management Oversight and Risk Tree (MORT) analysis tool is primarily used to:
- Calculate the probability of equipment failures using statistical models
- Identify management system deficiencies and oversights that contribute to accidents (Correct answer)
- Train new employees on hazard recognition techniques
- Rank corrective actions by cost-benefit ratio
Correct answer: Identify management system deficiencies and oversights that contribute to accidents
MORT is a comprehensive analytical logic tree used to identify both specific control failures and management system weaknesses that allowed an accident to occur.
Question 7: When determining the 'scope' of an accident investigation, the safety supervisor should consider:
- Only the events that occurred in the final 30 seconds before injury
- The severity of the injury and potential severity, as well as recurrence probability (Correct answer)
- The legal liability of the company exclusively
- Whether the injured worker was following written procedures
Correct answer: The severity of the injury and potential severity, as well as recurrence probability
Investigation scope and depth should be proportional to both the actual outcome and the worst potential outcome, as well as the likelihood of recurrence.
CSS Accident Investigation and Analysis 3
During an accident investigation interview, which technique best encourages a witness to provide a full, unfiltered account?