Almost all the major accident investigations--Texas City, Piper Alpha, the Phillips 66 explosion, Feyzin, Mexico City--show human error as the principal cause, either in design, operations, maintenance, or the management of safety. This book provides practical advice that can substantially reduce human error at all levels. In eight chapters--packed with case studies and examples of simple and advanced techniques for new and existing systems--the book challenges the assumption that human error is "unavoidable." Instead, it suggests a systems perspective. This view sees error as a consequence of a mismatch between human capabilities and demands and inappropriate organizational culture. This makes error a manageable factor and, therefore, avoidable.

The CENTER FOR CHEMICAL PROCESS SAFETY (CCPS), an industry technology alliance of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), has been a world leader in developing and disseminatinginformation on process safety management and technology since 1985. CCPS has published over 80 books in its process safety guidelines and process safety concepts series. For more information, visit www.ccpsonline.org.