Orlando - Rosemary Bernal-Gomez of Southern California Edison gave a lesson in predictive analytics at a Tuesday afternoon education session at the annual conference of the American Safety of Professionals (ASSP) that drew a round of applause from the audience.

Southern California Edison averaged about four fatalities a year when one of those lost was a friend of Rosemary’s. She said she drove home from the funeral thinking, what can I do to help make sure there are no more funerals?

She knew enough about field work in the utility industry after a 30-year career to understand the importance of work orders. SoCal Edison generates 2,000 work orders every month. A math whiz, Rosemary developed a predictive analytic model that compared new work orders with historical serious injury and fatality cases, using five years of data for pattern recognition. Five risk factors indicated high risk work – weather, type of equipment, location, PPE and the need for calibrated equipment and tools.

She learned that the biggest risks occur on sunny days, when workers are at ease, not on high alert. Her coding picked up only high risk work orders using the five risk indicators. If any were present in an order, it was flagged. “This enabled a proactive intervention before the work begins,” she said. “I’m not telling the workers how to do their job. I’ve never climbed a 60-foot pole. I’m providing them information for their own safety.”

Since taking safety from reactive to proactive in 2018, SoCal Edison has not experienced a fatality, she said. And the room erupted in applause.