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Newsletter No 1 - November 2005

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Overview

The Standing Committee on Structural Safety evolved as a result of a CIRIA Study Committee on Structural Safety in 1971 which recommended that "the establishment of a professional committee on a permanent basis to keep under review questions of structural safety and make such recommendations for action as seem desirable".

Topics for consideration by SCOSS arise from many sources, but in future it is intended that the outputs from CROSS will be a significant component. SCOSS seeks information on matters related to the people, process and products connected with structural engineering. It identifies where risks are thought likely to be unacceptable and then seeks changes of practice which will maintain safety. Feedback is essential and has in the past been received through the day-to-day interaction of SCOSS members with the professions, industry and government. Almost two hundred topics have been closely studied. Many of these are, by their nature, fundamental and ongoing and of a general nature. Others are relatively detailed and result from incidents reported to SCOSS as potential problems.

It might be thought that the existence of SCOSS was sufficient. Whilst a process is in place allowing issues to be flagged confidentially to SCOSS, submissions to SCOSS are made by a limited number of people. This has worked well, but there are drawbacks. Firstly it can be difficult to establish the extent of a problem – a problem may be widespread but only identified by a few people. This can be limiting in terms of persuading others to attach sufficient priority to addressing it. Secondly, in our industry there are many issues which do not grab a headline in the way that past structural failures have. They are not always technical – requiring design rules to revisited – but are often procedural.

Learning from the past is an essential component of development, for indeed without memory, and the ability to pass this on, failures are repeated. The same mistakes are made and the same accidents occur, at 20 year intervals. The ‘habit of retentiveness’ was quoted by recently by the incoming President of the Institution of Civil Engineers Gordon Masterton as one of the necessities for progress.

CROSS is aimed at engineers and others working in construction who, by contributing their experiences, will help to improve structural safety. SCOSS will, as a result of analyzing the data received, use its influence with Industry, Institutions, and Government to effect changes where this is seen to bring sustainable benefit to our industry.

Alastair Soane

Overview of Reports in this Newsletter

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