Tragedy on the Movie Set Rust

 

I work at an electric utility.  My job is IT-related, providing support to our power plant workers and field personnel (linemen and other electrical workers).  As a part of that job, I attend safety meetings.  Safety is big at our electric utility and again and again is called the first priority for employees, with providing electricity to our consumers as a second priority.

My job is not as hazardous as the electrical workers I support, but my job does take me inside power plants and substations, and my training includes safety protocols to follow while in those facilities.  In addition, the technology I am responsible for assists in making those facilities a safer place.

With regards to the recent accidental shooting on the set of the movie Rust, I have some observations working for an employer with a safety culture given the facts (still subject to change at this early date).

Fact one:  Before this tragedy, there had been a previous incident involving an accidental live ammunition discharge on set.

Was there a safety stand down?  If something equivalent had happened in one of my employer’s power plants, there would have at least been an investigation and preliminary findings would have been shared with all personnel, even office employees not working at the plant.  My employer is committed to transparency.  While accountability is part of our safety program, actual names would not be shared, just the incident and the findings.

Another tenet of our safety program is that safety is everyone’s responsibility.  Our field personnel, usually linemen, are allowed, but not required, to carry firearms in the field, because, bears.  But before granted that permission, they are required to attend a firearms safety course, even though the average Alaskan has considerable knowledge about firearms, even the ones that don’t own one.

Was there a firearms safety course that all personnel, especially the actors, had to attend?  Were they instructed on how to check any firearm handed to them on whether it was loaded or not?  Were firearms handed to them with the safety on?  Was there a safety on that firearm?  Did all personnel handling firearms on the set, including the actors know how to tell the difference between a blank and actual live ammunition?

Was there a safety briefing before the scene was to be shot?  Going back to my electric utility employer, all field personnel are required to have a safety briefing before entering a substation.  All plant personnel are required to have such a briefing before starting a task on the floor of the plant.

Those are just some of the questions I expect the investigation of this incident to address.

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  1. Al Sparks Coolidge
    Al Sparks
    @AlSparks

    Henry Racette (View Comment):
    his was tragic. It seems very likely that there was real negligence involved; it’s hard to see how it might have happened absent that. But I’m skeptical that Mr. Baldwin was the individual most responsible in the chain of negligence, despite the fact that he is the one who shot the poor woman.

    If his job was restricted to acting, then I see your point.  But we have to learn what his co-producer role was, and whether that was just a title or whether that title came with real responsibility.  I’m not a professional in the movie business, but my understanding is there two layers of management on a movie set.

    The director works with the actors and cameramen to actually make the picture.  The producer manages everything else, including payroll and hiring and firing.  That means he’s responsible for policy.  He’s responsible for safety.

    That is a simplistic description of the management, and when I  look at the credits at the end of a movie, I often see executive producers, lots of them in credits.  Was Baldwin in charge of that set?  Was he just learning a new function behind the camera?

    In accepting that title, he also accepted more liability.  How much liability that actually was will come out in the wash.

    • #61
  2. Al Sparks Coolidge
    Al Sparks
    @AlSparks

    Henry Racette (View Comment):
    But then, every driver should walk behind his car before backing out of his driveway, to make sure there isn’t a toddler sitting behind it; I suspect that kills more people every year than on-set gun accidents. But I only do that simple thing sometimes, not all the time.

    First, since you are limiting the accidental firearm fatalities to on-movie sets, then that’s a plausible argument.  But if you take all accidental firearm fatalities into account, it probably exceeds the instances of drivers killing toddlers while backing out of their driveway.  And considering all accidental firearm fatalities gives you a better idea of how dangerous firearms are and the need for safety practices.

    As an aside, I back into driveways on the theory that it’s safer to back in than back out.  Though the possibility of killing a toddler in front of your backed in vehicle might still be as significant a possibility.

    • #62
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