BARKSDALE AIR FORCE BASE, La. -- The 2nd Bomb Wing Safety office hosted its annual fall Safety Day brief at Hoban Hall, Aug. 31, 2017.
With summer coming to an end and fall bringing in the start of the hunting season, Wing Leadership and guest speaker Tony Crow spoke to Team Barksdale about risk management and applying safety both on and off-duty.
“We are having this safety day to make sure people understand risk management aspects,” said
Richard Knowles, 2nd Bomb Wing occupational safety manager. “Our main goal here is for our folks to understand to take safety home with you and apply risk management to everything that we do.”
As part of an analysis conducted by the safety office, it was found that in the past two years Barksdale had a total of 144 mishaps.
“During our analysis we found that out of those 144 mishaps 73 percent of those were on duty, and the large bulk of those were occupational and industrial mishaps,” Knowles said.
Keeping up with the theme of safety, Tony Crow, founder of the not for profit corporation, It’s Not Just About Me, was invited to the podium to speak. Crow was blinded in 2003 during a hunting accident.
“I have one goal in mind for you today,” said Tony Crow, INJAM founder. “When you leave and go about your day today I hope that I’ve said something to you today that will never leave you for the rest of your life.”
Airmen listened as Crow spoke about the circumstances involving his accident.
“On Feb. 15, 2003, at three in the afternoon my life, my families’ lives and my friends’ lives would change forever, in a blink of an eye, just like that,” Crow said. “While hunting our dog pointed at me and I failed to communicate back with my son. Following the quail, my son aimed at my direction and not seeing [me] camouflaged in that brush wearing that khaki shirt and pants he turned and shot me in the face with a 12-gauge shotgun. I went form uncorrected 20/20 vision to complete lights out just like that.”
After his accident Crow decided to use his experiences to warn others about proper risk management and how to use it to increase safety both at home and at the workplace.
“For me there are 3 ingredients to a safe workforce” Crow said. “The first one, it takes training, you have to show people, tell people the right way, the correct way to do things. The second one is leadership, there will always have to be people that you can count on to be a safety leader. The third ingredient is teamwork. When it comes to safety, teamwork is the most important part. Sometimes your teammates maybe see things you don’t see; dangers you don’t see. “
Wherever at work or at home, risk management proves to be a crucial tool to increase both personal and family safety. Crow’s story and message aimed to inspire team Barksdale to apply risk management at all times to reduce the amount of accidents and keeping Barksdale’s Airmen safe, ready and in the fight.