The Standards Are Written in Blood
After witnessing the aftermath of a fatal electrical contact incident in Central America, Bryan reflects on why safety standards matter and why too many of them only exist because someone else paid the price first.
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If you have ever spent time in another country as an environmental health and safety professional, you know how quickly your eyes go to the hazards. You notice missing guarding, inconsistent PPE, environmental exposure issues, electrical risks, and all the other things that make you stop and think, that should not be happening like that.
A few weeks ago, my family and I had the opportunity to spend some time in Central America. Every day we went up and down the hill near our rental, we saw a man painting a house. We would wave at him, give him a thumbs up, and let him know he was doing a good job. It became one of those small things you start to expect when you have been in a place for a few days.
Then one afternoon, while we were relaxing, we heard two loud booms. Right after that, we heard screaming. A few moments later, we heard paramedics. It all happened fast, but in the moment it felt like time slowed down.
Later, when we walked into town, the whole mood felt different. People seemed somber. You could tell something serious had happened. We asked what went on, and that is when we found out the man painting the house had been working from a second-story awning and got too close to an electrical line. He made contact and fell to the ground.
We were told he had severe burns on one side of his body. We also learned that he had two heart attacks while being transported to the hospital.
When we got home from vacation, we kept checking for updates and ended up following a Facebook post about what had happened. A few days later, we found out the man did not survive.
Why This Stuck With Me
That one stuck with me.
I share that story because in EHS it is easy sometimes to get frustrated with standards, policies, procedures, permits, and regulatory requirements. On some days they can feel like they are just in the way of getting the job done. But the truth is, they are not there by accident.
They are there because people have been injured. They are there because people have been killed. Every serious safety standard has a story behind it. Most of the time, more than one. That is why people say those standards are written in blood.
The Reality of Necessity
One of the realities you see in many developing areas is necessity. People need the work. Families need the income. Jobs still have to get done. When necessity takes over, people will often do whatever they think it takes to finish the job, especially if they have not been trained properly, have not been given the right equipment, or simply do not know a safer way to do the work.
That is not always recklessness. Sometimes it is lack of resources. Sometimes it is weak oversight. Sometimes it is normalization of risk. Sometimes it is just the mindset that this is how the work gets done.
But hazards do not care about any of that.
Electricity does not care if somebody is trying to provide for their family. Gravity does not care if the schedule is tight. Exposure does not care if production is under pressure. Hazards do not care about good intentions.
Why Standards Matter
Since OSHA was created in 1971, workplace injuries and fatalities in this country have gone down significantly. That did not happen by accident. It happened because standards, enforcement, training, and expectations pushed organizations to control risk better. That does not mean every regulation is perfect, and it does not mean every procedure is written well. But it does mean the existence of standards is a good thing.
Requirements for electrical clearance, proper training, guarding, PPE, planning, supervision, and hazard recognition are not just bureaucratic annoyances. They are protections built out of hard lessons that cost real people their health and, in some cases, their lives.
More Than Just a Story
What made this one hit especially hard for me is that this man was not just some story we heard about later. He was somebody we had seen every day. Somebody working. Somebody trying to provide. Somebody alive one moment and gone a few days later because he got too close to an energized line while doing a job that should never have exposed him to that kind of risk.
That is why I have a hard time when people talk about safety requirements like they are mostly red tape. Yes, some paperwork is unnecessary. Yes, some systems are clumsy. Yes, some organizations create process that does not add much value. But the real purpose behind good safety standards is not to make work harder. It is to keep people alive. It is to keep workers from going home burned, crushed, poisoned, shocked, or not going home at all.
The Takeaway
If you ever catch yourself thinking, why do we have to follow all of these policies, procedures, and standards, it is worth stopping and asking a better question: what happens when we do not?
Sometimes nothing happens right away. Sometimes the consequences stay hidden for a while. And sometimes there are two loud booms, screaming in the street, and a family following a Facebook post back home only to learn that a man they waved to every day is not coming home.
Standards matter. Training matters. Regulatory bodies matter. Hazard recognition matters. Even when compliance feels frustrating, inconvenient, or slow, it is still better than the alternative.
Too many of the rules we work under today only exist because somebody else paid for them first.
Bryan Barker is an EHS professional with experience across construction, mining, general industry, and environmental leadership. True North EHS provides practical safety insight for real-world operations.
