FORT INDIANTOWN GAP, Pa. –
Stressing the importance of health and safety, the 29th Health and Safety Awareness Day was held here May 12.
It was the first time the event was held since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The event was organized by the Pennsylvania Army and Air National Guard safety offices and the Pennsylvania Department of Military and Veterans Affairs Safety Office.
It featured more than 20 exhibitors, including Pennsylvania State Police, the American Red Cross, the Lebanon Veterans Affairs Medical Center, OSHA and UPMC.
There were also hands-on exhibits, including a distracted driving simulator at which users wore goggles to simulate the effects of alcohol and a fire extinguisher simulator. There was also AED training and motorcycle safety training available for attendees.
“The idea is to promote safety,” said Lt. Col. Deborah Fisher, state safety officer for the Pennsylvania Army National Guard and one of the event’s organizers. “We have a special emphasis on summer safety and off-duty safety. We really try hard to have exhibitors here that the attendees can engage in and not just walk through and pick up a pamphlet.”
To be most effective, safety should be incorporated into everyday life, Fisher said.
“We like to say many times safety is just common sense and being engaged and having some forethought,” she said. “Just think through, ‘If I do this, what could happen?’ And that often can prevent a lot of mishaps.”
Kari Evans, workers compensation coordinator for the DMVA and another of the event’s organizers, said she believes people generally take health and safety seriously.
“I think employees take safety and health more seriously than maybe they have in the past, and that’s good because we should all try our best to stay safe,” she said.
Evans said Health and Safety Awareness Day is a great event and it is usually well attended.
“I love it,” she said. “I look forward to it every year. I’ve been doing it for quite some time and I know employees look forward to it.”
Speaking at the event, Pennsylvania Adjutant General Maj. Gen. Mark Schindler, said a lot of safety is common sense.
“What everyone needs to do is make it a part of the culture of where you work, and a part of the culture of your home,” Schindler said. “Safety is the one thing that should level ranks in your organization. It should level the hierarchy of your organizations in civilian employment. It should be the one thing that Private So-And-So can get up and say, ‘General, this is not safe.’ It should be the one thing where you son or daughter or your neighbor could say, ‘We need to stop. This is not safe.’”
Accidents are going to happen, Schindler said, but a lot of them are preventable.
“We just have to empower the right people to be able to look at something and say, ‘Let me fix that. Let me not be the person who walks by it,’” Schindler said. “And that takes everybody, not just the senior person. Anybody can stop an accident from happening, and that’s what we need everybody to do in the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs. If you see something unsafe, say something.”
Additional Health and Safety Awareness Day events are scheduled for May 24 at the 171st Air Refueling Wing headquarters in Coraopolis, Pa., and on June 2 at the 111th Attack Wing Headquarters on Biddle Air National Guard Base in Horsham, Pa.