Feature | Improving structural safety by sharing lessons learned
IMPROVING STRUCTURAL SAFETY BY SHARING LESSONS LEARNED
CROSS-AUS (Collaborative Reporting for Safer Structures Australasia) is the confidential reporting system established in Australasia in 2018 to capture and share lessons learned from structural safety issues which might not otherwise get public recognition. As Eleanor Roosevelt succinctly put it:
Importantly, all CROSS websites are interconnected so that all reports from all regions are freely available to everyone no matter their location.
“Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t live long enough to make them all yourself”.
A non-profit company limited by guarantee, CROSS-AUS Ltd, was formed in 2018 to run, manage, and promote CROSS in Australasia. This company is wholly owned by the Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE) and is managed by a Board of Directors appointed by IStructE. This allows CROSS-AUS to remain completely independent and publish all relevant material to aid professionals in the built environment without commercial concerns. In addition, there is an Expert Panel of volunteers who provide commentary on reports that are submitted. They use their experience to identify the underlying causes of safety issues and the lessons to be learned.
However, all too often, when something goes wrong one’s instinct is to try to conceal it, or when there is a significant failure, legal proceedings will prevent disclosure of the event. As then President of The Institution of Structural Engineers, Faith Wainwright, stated when launching CROSS-AUS during the Australasian Structural Engineering Conference, in Adelaide, in September 2018: “As professional engineers we have a profound duty to ensure the safety of all those who use the structures we design and build. Sharing feedback on near misses or concerns is not always easy and CROSS is a successful community platform to allow professionals to do this simply, without attributing blame. Thus, the objective of CROSS is to help the construction profession to learn from its experiences and it is recognised for making improvements in public safety. CROSS-AUS builds on the success of CROSS-UK, the unique UK-based system which has been operating successfully since 2005 and is now part of a growing network of CROSS programmes internationally, including CROSS-US. 22 Consulting Matters
Who we are
How does it work Safety reports can be submitted to CROSS by anyone who works in the industry. The reports are processed as shown in the following diagram. Confidentiality is a critical aspect of the process and neither personal details nor information that could be used to identify a project or product are seen by anyone other than by one of the Designated Persons who de-identifies them to remove details of the reporter and any other identifying features.
