Emergency stop: luxury or necessity?
The standards and guidelines for machine safety are similar to the rules of our health care system. The healthcare system has three types of care: preventive, regular and emergency (acute) care.
Preventive care
Preventive care takes place outside doctors' surgeries and pharmacies and mainly has to do with a healthy lifestyle. The right food, sport and exercise, social contacts, meditation, etc. Of course, it may happen that, on the basis of reports and signals, one picks up a medicine from the pharmacy now and then or consults one's GP.
Regular care
If someone ends up in regular care, it means that he/she is not functioning optimally and that something is wrong. One goes to the family doctor and receives the necessary treatment. This can vary from medication to a course of treatment at the physiotherapist, for example. In principle, these are short, corrective procedures with the aim of returning to normal. However, there are also chronic processes whereby someone stays in treatment for a long time. Hospitalisation also falls under regular care. This is an escalation of regular care because it is felt that the patient needs more attention and sometimes certain interventions (operations).
Emergency room
This brings us to the emergency room for cases where acute care is needed. There should be no hesitation here, because these are emergencies. And emergencies call for an emergency stop. The same applies to machines. Of course, you would prefer that situations never arise in which you have to press the emergency stop button. And that all measures in accordance with the risk assessments with the correct SIL or PL values remain in the preventive or regular care. But if the worst comes to the worst, one should not hesitate to press the emergency button. Do not forget to build into your 'design' the reset to go back to a safe situation.
The question is: is the emergency stop a luxury or a necessity?
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