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At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

reuters.com

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Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#51

Post by virgil_ »

virgil_ wrote: post #27

As some who worked there for 4.5 years, this is an accurate description of the work culture at SpaceX. You sacrifice safety for speed. As a young person it’s an opportunity to take on a lot responsibilities, but at that point in your life you don’t have the fortitude to tell Elon, who does push the agenda directly to personnel, to say you do not deem this task safe/smart/responsible. Gwynn is a sly leader that tries…

Also, those numbers would be way more if they actually reported all the injuries and/or caught them all. Employees definitely hide their injuries cuz they want to keep their job.

If you guys only knew about the “near-misses” as well, they are wild.

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#52

Post by rsynnott »

KineticLensman wrote: post #34
mschuster91 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany, workplace injuries have gone continuously down over the decades [1], and at 1,827 per 1000 workers it's significantly less than the US with 2,7 [2]. The difference is pretty certainly due to way less regulations and enforcement in the US combined with way greedier employers. [1] https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/6051/umfrage/... [2] https://www.bls.gov/charts/injuries-and-illnesses/total-nonf…

> In Germany, workplace injuries have gone continuously In the UK our safety films just had John Cleese standing on a swivel chair. But the Germans had Forklift Driver Klaus [0], which is much more compelling: "Cruel but informative accidents happen". Never have I seen a forklift and a chainsaw cause so much carnage. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forklift_Driver_Klaus_–_The_Fi...

Not sure about that; the UK has some truly nightmarish safety PSAs in the 70s and 80s, though they were mostly aimed at children, I suppose.

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#53

Post by fernandotakai »

hnbad wrote: post #29
fernandotakai wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

when bad things happen, elon is responsible. when good things happen, elon had nothing to do with it, he's useless and only do harm.

The thing is that the bad things are usually failures of management, the good things are feats of engineering. Elon Musk is despite the title he bestowed upon himself, not a rocket scientist. He's an ideas guy at worst and an activist executive at best. That the first three Tesla models spell out "S3X" is entirely on him. That they're fairly decent electrical cars is not. That there are superchargers everywhere is on…

>Elon Musk is despite the title he bestowed upon himself, not a rocket scientist. He's an ideas guy at worst and an activist executive at best.

while i agree, we also have jim cantrell (an actual rocket scientist) comments on musk[0]:

>"He is the smartest guy I've ever met, period," Cantrell tells us. "I know that sounds overblown. But I've met plenty of smart people, and I don't say that lightly. He's absolutely, frickin' amazing. I don't even think he sleeps."

now, am i a musk fanboi? nope. he has some horrible ideas (twitter is x? wtf?). but is he just an "ideas" guy? absolutely not.

[0] https://www.businessinsider.com/how-elon-musk-learned-rocket...

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#54

Post by dkjaudyeqooe »

mirekrusin wrote: post #40
infecto wrote: post #26

Not here defending SpaceX, cannot speak for some of the specific cases like the individual who was sitting on top of a truck to hold a load down. What I don't like though is the lack of real comparison. It reads more like a hit piece against spacex with all the specific examples of cases that tug at the heart. Would like to see some better comparison, I don't know how realistic the space industry average is. How many…

Exactly, ie. Qatar had something like 40 deaths during World Cup construction.

So just the cost of doing business.

You're ok with yourself or a loved one dying on that basis?

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#55

Post by usrusr »

robertlagrant wrote: post #36
usrusr wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corporate policy that implements regulations would be my guess. Or, in this case, does not. Other countries are far more into preemptive enforcement of regulations than the USA, but even there things tends to only get better before they get worse. Tesla Grünheide has already racked up at least one amputation, and that's a factory, not a place where they invent new kinds of rockets.

But regulations don't say "fire this person". They're normally far more high level than that, like, "when something bad happens, trigger a corrective and preventative actions process and write down what you found and what you're going to change, if anything".

Effective regulations very much do put the employer on the hook, no way to accept something like "voluntary employee risk-taking" outside of in some cases not looking for it as hard as they could. Employers are at risk of getting fined for tolerating (or worse) employee risk-taking and if those fines are sufficiently high they will certainly tell the employee "stop doing that that or else". And the last stage of "or else" certainly is getting fired, perfectly in line with other worker protection laws that might be in place that would otherwise prevent that getting fired.

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#56

Post by bandyaboot »

tekla wrote: post #11

I'm still unsure as to why people are blaming Elon when I've been continuously told on this site that Glenn Shotwell is running everything.

I would think that if you actually see that sort of comment so often that it would be reasonable to exaggerate it as “continuous”, you would be familiar enough with the person in question to know their actual name.

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#57

Post by dkjaudyeqooe »

butler14 wrote: post #44
hef19898 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultimately, a worker sitting on top of a truck to hold down a load, is a failure of the company: rules and trainings have to be implace to avoid this unsafe behavior, managers, and ultimately the CEO, has to enforce those rules. If that doesn't happen an unsafe culture is promoted, one that leads to accidents.

How do you train someone not to do stupid sh*t like that? What’s saying that employee didn’t go through H&S training? I get the legalities, it’s just a fringe case to the extreme, and conflation of that case to imply some wider problem. Reads like a hit piece.

Some companies have a strong safety culture. The importance of safety is prioritised. For instance, they are allowed and required to stop work being performed if they see a safety violation [1].

If you take safety seriously you're likely to have a safe workplace. If not you get these sorts of shenanigans.

[1] https://millercares.com/how-stop-work-authority-helps-preven...

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#59

Post by reneherse »

virgil_ wrote: post #51
virgil_ wrote: post #27

As some who worked there for 4.5 years, this is an accurate description of the work culture at SpaceX. You sacrifice safety for speed. As a young person it’s an opportunity to take on a lot responsibilities, but at that point in your life you don’t have the fortitude to tell Elon, who does push the agenda directly to personnel, to say you do not deem this task safe/smart/responsible. Gwynn is a sly leader that tries…

Also, those numbers would be way more if they actually reported all the injuries and/or caught them all. Employees definitely hide their injuries cuz they want to keep their job. If you guys only knew about the “near-misses” as well, they are wild.

I'm not surprised at all that the number of injuries sustained on SpaceX projects is even worse than described in the article.

The article only discusses employee injuries; A full accounting would also include data from on-site contractors such as those involved in the heavy construction of the launch towers and other facilities.

Re: At SpaceX, worker injuries soar in Elon Musk's rush to Mars

#60

Post by yreg »

mschuster91 wrote: post #17
yreg wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's always the case with space industry (or even any heavy industry), no?

In Germany, workplace injuries have gone continuously down over the decades [1], and at 1,827 per 1000 workers it's significantly less than the US with 2,7 [2]. The difference is pretty certainly due to way less regulations and enforcement in the US combined with way greedier employers. [1] https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/6051/umfrage/... [2] https://www.bls.gov/charts/injuries-and-illnesses/total-nonf…

So in Germany, 1.827 per 1000 die, but it is a sacrifice we are willing to make.
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