Unsafe conditions - Engineer's Responsibility

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SteveO NE

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Engineer
Hi,

I am wondering what codes, rules, guidelines (including reference to NSPE Code of Ethics - e.g. Hold paramount the safety, health, and welfare of the public, etc.) may exist as it pertains to finding and responding unsafe conditions. I would think that NFPA 70E gives and electrician or an electrical inspector to red-tag out equipment but not sure that would extend to an engineer - is the most you can do is advise the customer, AHJ, or FMO, that the equipment poses personal and property risk and that you advise de-energizing?

Maybe I am missing something but I don't see anything in NFPA 70 about it. In scope work is easy to deal with, specify the change needed to make something safe; however, what about something discovered that you aren't touching (out of scope) during the install. I know obviously you can refuse to stamp a drawing set but they will just find someone else who won't care that will stamp it so what do you do?

Maybe I am missing something obvious so don't flame me here, just trying to learn. It is relevant for me at the moment because have an issue with a customer who wants us to go back and fix work that was in scope and while I went out and assessed the site I found something else in the service entrance (damaged main switch), that we shouldn't need to touch during the correction, I'm not sure I am comfortable ignoring the problem but also know that if I say we need to fix that before completing the other work the customer will treat it as retaliation even though we agree we need to fix our issue and they are aware of the issue I discovered (whistle-blowing would still likely cause the same problem - though a good inspector will see this as well during our repair work which will require a permit). That's why I'd need rock solid reference or best practice to be able to say they must fix this problem (through us or another contractor) when we pull the permit.

Thanks in advance.

Steve
 
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My $0.02... Don't worry about retaliation if it could cause a safety issue.. so report it (if so) to the owner.. Protect others and let yourself sleep at night. If you're a registered professional engineer, there's a good chance you had to agree to a code of ethics (or something from NSPE like you mentioned). There may be some verbiage in there about the safety of the public that would apply to even portions that you didn't design. You could even bring up the issue and state that you don't care if they hire someone else to fix it other than you if you truly are just looking out for others.

Unfortunately this is all easier said than done sometimes. Good luck.

ETA: Another difficult thing to consider is that if you didn't report it, and something bad did happen, and it was discovered that you knew about the issue and didn't bring it up you could find yourself in a lawsuit... even if it's just a civil case.
 
Nfpa 70e gives no guidance on this issue imo.

Personally, unless you are hired to review the design or safety of something I see no reason to worry at all about penny ante code violations. Every place has them and they just don't matter.

If there is an actual safety concern you happen to run across outside of your professional duties, there is nothing to prevent you from bringing it to the owner's attention. But nothing that requires it either.

A damaged main switch is a pretty vague description. If it still functions how is it a safety problem if it has a scratch or dent?
 
petersonra said:
If there is an actual safety concern you happen to run across outside of your professional duties, there is nothing to prevent you from bringing it to the owner's attention. But nothing that requires it either.
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The extremes are easy, right? If, for example, a PE were to find a switch where the enclosure was energized and presented a threat of electrocution but didn't say anything, and someone got killed because of it, he'd better have great insurance and a good lawyer to try to protect his license.
 
Report all and any findings. Then offer a quote or get a quote to fix it if applicable. Really all you can do to be responsible.
 
petersonra said:
Nfpa 70e gives no guidance on this issue imo.

Personally, unless you are hired to review the design or safety of something I see no reason to worry at all about penny ante code violations. Every place has them and they just don't matter.

If there is an actual safety concern you happen to run across outside of your professional duties, there is nothing to prevent you from bringing it to the owner's attention. But nothing that requires it either.

A damaged main switch is a pretty vague description. If it still functions how is it a safety problem if it has a scratch or dent?
Click to expand...
This is certainly not true for a professional engineer. I am required, by the terms of my licensure, to put the welfare of the public above any personal interest, including those of my client or employer. If I report a field condition that appears, in my professional judgement, to present a safety hazard and the GC or subcontractor doesn't abate it, I must push it up the line to the state or federal OSHA, or other competent body. And because a lot of job sites now require OSHA 10 training, I risk getting my ticket pulled if I try to claim "I didn't know."
 
Safety First and Foremost! If it puts you and your crew in immanent danger then YES, say something! If its something that is easily correctable and not to time consuming, fix it and sleep better at night knowing you corrected a hazard and possibly saved a life or 2! Its like smoking and pumping gas at the same time. Im not gonna do it!!! Cheers and Hope it helps a little...
 
Sorry I didn't get to respond sooner had a little bit of a crazy week. Thanks for all the responses they do help solidify my
line of thinking. Pretty much in line with what I was saying, the requirements are based on the ethical guidelines (which usually licensure is based on).

The issue is serious enough but I don't believe imminent; however that is just a matter of time. Essentially the service entrance gear is below grade (kind of) but the, conduit comes from utility pole/riser with no weather-head down to grade into a 90 degree sweep it then goes straight and 'bridges' over a small walk walkway against the foundation, through a wall penetration into the top of a main fused disconnect on a 3 wire delta (480V) service.
It is obvious there is significant water intrusion into that main switch and it is rusting out. There is no mastic in the pipe so water just freely comes from the riser into the main switch. Someday eventually I'd guess the back panel would rot out fall right onto the bus...seen it happen before with a similar root cause.

We have notified the owner who said they were planning to fix it and upgrade to a 4W Wye and already got quotes. We said we'll change out the service to a 4W Wye which will avoid our other costs to fix an error on-site and take off what that cost is from changing the service out. Essentially its very unlikely anyone would compete with that cost and it makes sense instead of doing redundant work. The owner wants us to just fix our issue and worry about that after.

Is the owner's acknowledgement and promise to fix enough knowing the issue is serious but not yet imminent, or should it be pointed out to the AHJ (someone else? Who would you usually escalate to first?)? Should we use our work to lever that to move forward at least concurrently (i.e. acknowledge we have something to fix but say we can't do it without that being fixed first)? I told them there is a risk that when we do that work, the AHJ could take issue with the main switch as well and could even red-tag the device and have power shut off to the building if he thought it was serious enough.
 
SteveO NE said:
I know obviously you can refuse to stamp a drawing set but they will just find someone else who won't care that will stamp it so what do you do?
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As an aside, my experience in confronting a 'stamped set of prints' ended up with the state, GC, owner, archy & engineer all wanting my head on a courtroom plate

A decade later, they saw it my way

lesson learned?

the world is not exclusively 'white' or 'black' hats..., especially when it comes to our trades liability

~RJ~
 
To me, the notion of professional ethics is such a natural thing that I never bothered to wonder whether there is any law that requires it. I vaguely recall that the process of obtaining one of the PE licenses that I once held (I don't recall which) required me to sign on to a pledge to obey their code of ethics. That said, if I observed a condition that I believed represented a real and present risk to personnel safety, I would report it to the owner.

Here, however, I depart from gadfly56's take on a PE's responsibility. Once I report an issue, I believe I can walk away. I am not obligated to verify that the issue is being resolved, nor to push the issue up the owner's chain of authority to force someone to act.
 
charlie b said:
Here, however, I depart from gadfly56's take on a PE's responsibility. Once I report an issue, I believe I can walk away. I am not obligated to verify that the issue is being resolved, nor to push the issue up the owner's chain of authority to force someone to act.
Click to expand...

I agree. My responsibility ends with notification. However notifying the janitor is not the same thing as notifying the 'manager'.
 
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