Wheels in Motion December 2017 - All I Want for Christmas

December 2017 Newsletter

This newsletter marks 9 years of 'Wheels in Motion'
So many stories shared over this time...
This month we talk Mobile phones, Technology,
we are now have Woody's Words as a Podcast and
All I want for Christmas...

2018 is nearly upon is….
Make sure you include a Safety Speaker
in your Safety Journey for 2018

Till next year...Stay Safe Australia

Plus Woody's Words and

Where are our Safety Speakers?

Take care and look out for each other.

James Wood & The CNBSafe Team

Get OFF Your Phone!

I’m guessing that most people that read this article will shrug it off and say ‘Won’t happen to me!’.... but I am starting to get really pissed off with Mobile Phones in vehicles.

Mobiles phones are great, they have transformed the way we communicate and the way we receive news and information, but I’m starting to get concerned about the risk they impose on us while we are driving.

Recently I was in the city in Melbourne, I was amazed at just how many people I noticed who were driving, texting, tweeting, facebooking…… At the same time as driving a vehicle or crossing the road.

I don’t know if I’m old fashioned but do we really need to be up to date with everything, surely it can wait a few minutes or a few hours if it means that we will be a little more focused on what we are doing rather than having our heads stuck down looking at our phones?

Christmas Time

I say this every year but please put in some extra effort to make sure that no one gets hurt this Christmas and new year period. This week I was helping my daughter wrap some gifts, I rang my boys to arrange our christmas get together and I spoke to my mum to make sure she was ready for us all at Christmas.

I reflected back to when my accident happened and I remembered the first Christmas after I got hurt. It was not a good time for me and for many of the people around me. There was uncertainty about my future, there was not the normal happy excited Christmas spirit that was there in previous years.

I know what it is like to live with an injury that happened to me at work, it impacted on everyone around me as well.

Please take a bit of time to make sure that you don’t get hurt at this time of year and you can enjoy it with the people that care for you and need you.
Happy Christmas everyone.

I’ve mentioned this before in a newsletter….
But have you ever thought about how much equipment costs for someone who has been hurt?

One of our Safety Speakers who had his arm amputated has had years of surgery and prosthetics costing many thousands of dollar.

I personally need wheelchairs and modified bikes and hand controls to drive a car and I’m due to replace my chair.

I’m looking at around $4500-$5500 for a new wheelchair!

So just think about that for a minute…… do you have $5000 sitting in your bank that you can use every couple of years when your wheelchair needs replaced?

Don't Rely on Technology

I picked my daughter up from school the other week. I was driving out of the school car park and a dual cab ute started to reverse out of a car space towards the front of my car.

I beeped the horn but they kept going and reversed into the front guard of my car!

We both got out and checked the damage, i had a dent in the guard, the light was scratched and the bonnet had a crease in it. His car had a scratch on the bumper!.... No one was hurt!

The person that hit me was another parent and we know each other so we swapped details and insurance information.

But as we were talking he said to me “I looked in the camera and didn’t see anything behind me”

So that got me thinking about how much we rely on technology these days, we have GPS that tells us where to go, we have Dr Google that tells us what is wrong with us when we are sick, and we now have a camera in our dash that we look at instead of looking behind us before we reverse!

C’mon people….. Don’t let technology dumb us down, think for yourself, and technology is meant to “Assist” us but not take over what we should all be doing!

Testimonial - Greg Smith

Greg Smith attended our site during National Safe Work Month as part of our Safety Week
program of events.

Two sessions were planned in order to ensure all personnel on site were able to attend from the technical workforce on the hangar floor, workshop and stores, to managers and supervisors, team leaders, engineers, administration, quality, commercial, procurement, safety and other office based personnel.

Greg story really resonated with the workforce as it was real, it began from hopes and dreams of the everyday teenager, the choices that were made, the accident, the impact, family and relationships, the uncertainty, life or death and the present.

I would highly recommend engaging Greg to talk at your sites and organisations, to tell his story as to put it bluntly, many of us have been there….. Done that…. but fortunately have had a different outcome – FATIGUE affects us all not just in the workplace.

Karen Roulston - BAE Systems