The
TALSO group met February 14 - Special thanks to Todd Baker and the
Environmental Protection Agency for hosting this event.
We reviewed the findings from our December meeting, then had good discussions on how to conduct a formal laser
safety hazard analysis and on actual laser safety accidents we know about. Some of our conclusions:
Hazard Evaluations [see also paper published in Operational
Radiation Safety]
- IF you can get users to notify the LSO before they bring
a new laser onto campus, a pre-installation checklist is useful for ensuring
that basic laser safety issues are addressed ahead of time.
- Getting Purchasing to screen capital purchases for lasers
is of limited value; it's better than nothing, but most laser purchases don't
include the word "laser" on the requisition, so often there's nothing
to catch.
- Get institutional "safety"
funding to correct existing laser safety deficiencies - this helps reduce
barriers to implementing a safety controls
Actual Laser Accidents we know about [disclaimer: I may
have gotten some details wrong and my notes are sketchy, but the lessons are
valid]:
- Grad student electrocuted [died] while improperly
handling laser power supply. Lesson:
electrical hazards are among the deadliest non-beam hazards & require
proper electrical safety precautions.
- Researcher eye injury.
Informal, undocumented beam alignment procedure left head near beam;
user lost track of it and caught beam in eye.
Lesson: ANSI identifies alignment as one of the most hazardous laser
operations. Generating a formal, written
alignment SOP gives the user a chance to think through how to do this more
carefully, and would have revealed the inherent danger in this informal
alignment practice.
- Bystander catches stray beam in eye. Lesson: the oft-heard rationalization
"what are the chances of a stray beam being in just the right place to hit
someone's eye" was proven invalid; it happens. Need to secure NHZ and ensure that everyone
therein has protective eyewear.
- Trach tube fire.
Lesson: operators need to keep laser fiber tip well beyond (at least 1
cm) the end of the trach tube when working in the bronchus (i.e. below the
trach tube); also need to carefully monitor oxygen levels.
Here's
the [growing] brainstormed list of specific discussion topics for upcoming
meetings:
-
Medical Surveillance (why, whom & how much?)
-
Entry way controls for class 4 systems
-
Tracking high power diode lasers
-
Appropriate fire-proof materials
-
Handling multiple wavelength lasers (e.g. TI:Sapphire)
-
Release of class 3b & 4 lasers into surplus & unrestricted use
-
Generate list of low-cost solutions to laser safety challenges & "low
hanging fruit" that get the most impact for the least resource expended in
laser safety programs
-
Generate a list of common excuses for not complying with laser safety guidance,
and ways to address these excuses
Finally,
we resolved that the next meeting will be held at GlaxoSmithKline site at
Thanks
to Jyl Burgener for agreeing to host this meeting!
P.S.
Here's another on-line Laser Safety training course. It's got a medical emphasis, but still good
material:668-3157
http://www.uhmc.sunysb.edu/oralbio/lasers/