At the start of your shift, your supervisor sends you to finish the repair job Bob is working on. Being safety-smart, you walk down the drawings to conduct lockout/tagout before starting. You put your locks and tags right alongside Bob’s.
You get out to the job, and don’t see Bob. “Ah, he must be removing his locks and tags.” No proper shift change occurred; you should have gone to the job first and had Bob walk down lockout/tagout with you.
Over the next three hours while you’re working on the job, the production supervisor repeatedly asks for a progress check. They really need this equipment running again.
You finish the repairs and go to remove your locks and tags. Bob’s are still there, and the production supervisor tells you to just cut the locks. Should you?
No. Never remove a lock that isn’t yours. Someone in management will need to make every effort to contact Bob. With any luck, Bob will answer the phone and either give the OK to remove his locks or come in and remove them himself. Production will have to wait.
