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Compared to what? US average fatal accident rate for construction is 9.2 deaths per 100,000 full-time workers per year. In oil and gas extraction it's 13.8. In

by Ajedi32 5mo ago

Compared to what? US average fatal accident rate for construction is 9.2 deaths per 100,000 full-time workers per year. In oil and gas extraction it's 13.8. In agriculture it's 20.9. In manufacturing it's 2.4. What's Starbase's rate? (Source: https://www.bls.gov/charts/census-of-fatal-occupational-injuries/number-and-rate-of-fatal-work-injuries-by-industry.htm https://www.bls.gov/charts/census-of-fatal-occupational-inju...)

bryanlarsen 5mo ago
Fatality rate is hard to compare because of the low divisor problem. Injury rate is 4.27 per 100. Which is under half the average value for active construction sites and 3x the average value for aerospace manufacturing facilities. Choose your comparator based on whether you want to praise or bash SpaceX.
- Ajedi32 5mo ago
  Yes. Starbase is an active construction site right now, so that's why I chose that as a point of comparison. But obviously there's also a lot of aerospace manufacturing happening at the same time, so it makes sense the number would be somewhere between those two industries.
- russdill 5mo ago
  The fatality occurred at a construction site, not an aerospace manufacturing facility.
- NamTaf 5mo ago
  Where are you getting construction as double that? This BLS site states that total recordable injuries is 2.2 per 100 employees. https://www.bls.gov/web/osh/table-1-industry-rates-national.htm https://www.bls.gov/web/osh/table-1-industry-rates-national.... Remember, this is reportable injuries. not LTIs, not fatalities. As an aside, as someone who works on major engineering construction projects, 4.27 per 100 people is huge. I'm used to sub-1.0, and something like 4.x would be stop-the-project-safety-intervention significant.
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orwin 5mo ago
Those are very, very high numbers, no? I think France is one of the worst offender in the western world (or at least worst in Europe by far) and we have slightly inferior rates (3 times the eurozone average), and it's a big issue. Not politically, almost no one cares about blue collar workers, especially not the current government, but in companies (at least in mine), reducing death became a focus point for three years.
jjk166 5mo ago
I'm surprised mining is so low. As an outsider, it seems like similar work to construction but with the danger turned up to 11. I can think of multiple potential explanations, but I have no intuitive sense of which, if any, is likely right.
- NamTaf 5mo ago
  I work in mining and mining-adjacent. Safety is taken seriously and process is rigorous. lock-out-tag-out, etc. is all huge in it. These metrics are reported on both internally and externally and make up major components of incentive payments. I'm completely used to management having 70+% of the incentive being tied to company performance, which is in turn strongly influenced by safety performance metrics. I'm used to targets well under sub-1.0 TRIR at class 1 operators. Something like 4 would pause the project.

by Ajedi32 5mo ago

bryanlarsen 5mo ago

Fatality rate is hard to compare because of the low divisor problem. Injury rate is 4.27 per 100. Which is under half the average value for active construction sites and 3x the average value for aerospace manufacturing facilities. Choose your comparator based on whether you want to praise or bash SpaceX.

Ajedi32 5mo ago
Yes. Starbase is an active construction site right now, so that's why I chose that as a point of comparison. But obviously there's also a lot of aerospace manufacturing happening at the same time, so it makes sense the number would be somewhere between those two industries.
russdill 5mo ago
The fatality occurred at a construction site, not an aerospace manufacturing facility.
NamTaf 5mo ago
Where are you getting construction as double that? This BLS site states that total recordable injuries is 2.2 per 100 employees. https://www.bls.gov/web/osh/table-1-industry-rates-national.htm https://www.bls.gov/web/osh/table-1-industry-rates-national.... Remember, this is reportable injuries. not LTIs, not fatalities. As an aside, as someone who works on major engineering construction projects, 4.27 per 100 people is huge. I'm used to sub-1.0, and something like 4.x would be stop-the-project-safety-intervention significant.

deleted 5mo ago

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orwin 5mo ago

Those are very, very high numbers, no? I think France is one of the worst offender in the western world (or at least worst in Europe by far) and we have slightly inferior rates (3 times the eurozone average), and it's a big issue. Not politically, almost no one cares about blue collar workers, especially not the current government, but in companies (at least in mine), reducing death became a focus point for three years.

jjk166 5mo ago

I'm surprised mining is so low. As an outsider, it seems like similar work to construction but with the danger turned up to 11. I can think of multiple potential explanations, but I have no intuitive sense of which, if any, is likely right.

NamTaf 5mo ago
I work in mining and mining-adjacent. Safety is taken seriously and process is rigorous. lock-out-tag-out, etc. is all huge in it. These metrics are reported on both internally and externally and make up major components of incentive payments. I'm completely used to management having 70+% of the incentive being tied to company performance, which is in turn strongly influenced by safety performance metrics. I'm used to targets well under sub-1.0 TRIR at class 1 operators. Something like 4 would pause the project.