Day 1
Today I had my site induction for Alcoa. My first day of work, technically anyway. If we’re getting technical then I guess it was really only half a day. I knew when I came to do my work experience here that there would be a fairly big focus on safety. It is a mine site after all. But I wasn’t really prepared for the extent to which the company goes to stress OH&S. Five hours of rhetoric about how to be safe on site (I managed to avoid the full two day course). With good reason; it seems like pretty much everything here can kill you. Don’t walk under that – It could crush you; don’t step in that puddle – it might have acid in it; don’t go outside without your goggles – you’ll get caustic dust in your eyes. I could fill a book that would make Tolstoy proud with all the ways you can die out here. Surprisingly that hasn’t happened too often over the years - I guess the focus on safety is paying for itself. The company is pretty proud of its record and doesn’t miss an opportunity to communicate it. There are signs aplenty spruiking the number of accident frees workdays. Having said all that, I’ll be working in the office so I think my biggest risks will be paper cuts and RSI.
On a lighter note, I learned that Alcoa produces 166 million lids for PET (Coke, Pepsi etc) bottles every day, and that the recent NASA space shuttle launch used powdered aluminium based fuel provided by Alcoa. Also, the safety chat culminated in them giving me a nice big salad roll and piece of carrot cake for lunch. I think its going to work out OK.
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