Erosion of Professional Integrity: The Collapse of the Canterbury TV Building in Christchurch on 22 February 2011

From 4 September 2010 on, a series of earthquakes shattered New Zealand for more than one year the most devastating of which caused the Canterbury TV (CTV) building in downtown Christchurch to collapse on 22 February 2011. One hundred and fifteen people were killed. A Royal Commission found out that, in 1986, the Christchurch City Council (CCC) had granted a building permit despite concerns about structural design issues. Moreover, the authority did not insist on structural analyses of the building after the initial earthquake of 4 September 2010. Thorough investigations after the disaster of 22 February 2011 revealed that the early concerns about insufficient joints between floors and shear walls had been entirely justified since the failure of the joints, according to all likelihood, had triggered the collapse of the building.

Which human factors design issues are influencing system performance in out-of-hours community palliative care? Integration of realist approaches with an established systems analysis framework to develop mid-range programme theory

ObjectiveTo develop mid-range programme theory from perceptions and experiences of out-of-hours community palliative care, accounting for human factors design issues that might be influencing system performance for achieving desirable outcomes through quality improvement.SettingCommunity providers and users of out-of-hours palliative care.Participants17 stakeholders participated in a workshop event.DesignIn the UK, around 30% of people receiving palliative care have contact with out-of-hours services. Interactions between emotions, cognition, tasks, technology and behaviours must be considered to improve safety. After sharing experiences, participants were presented with analyses of 1072 National Reporting and Learning System incident reports. Discussion was orientated to consider priorities for change. Discussions were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim by the study team. Event artefacts, for example, sticky notes, flip chart lists and participant notes, were retained for analysis. Two researchers independently identified context–mechanism–outcome configurations using realist approaches before studying the inter-relation of configurations to build a mid-range theory. This was critically appraised using an established human factors framework called Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS).ResultsComplex interacting configurations explain relational human-mediated outcomes where cycles of thought and behaviour are refined and replicated according to prior experiences. Five such configurations were identified: (1) prioritisation; (2) emotional labour; (3) complicated/complex systems; (4a) system inadequacies and (4b) differential attention and weighing of risks by organisations; (5) learning. Underpinning all these configurations was a sixth: (6a) trust and access to expertise; and (6b) isolation at night. By developing a mid-range programme theory, we have created a framework with international relevance for guiding quality improvement work in similar modern health systems.ConclusionsMeta-cognition, emotional intelligence, and informal learning will either overcome system limitations or overwhelm system safeguards. Integration of human-centred co-design principles and informal learning theory into quality improvement may improve results.

Design Issues of a Rotating to Linear Motion Magnetic Converter for Short-Distance Transport Applications

This paper discusses some design issues of a magnetic rotating to linear motion converter (RLMC), suitable for the propulsion system of a short-distance low-capacity vehicle. It basically operates like a magnetic rack, which executes the contactless conversion of the motor torque into a propulsion thrust, deriving from the interaction of on-board permanent magnet (PM) modules and stationary ferromagnetic steel pieces. A design procedure is set up that deals with both the PM module arrangement and the geometric shape of the steel pieces to optimize different performance aspects. A simplified modeling based on 2D transient finite element analyses is carried out to determine the thrust profile and the RLMC losses, which are essential to assess its practical feasibility. Finally, the characteristics as functions of the load angle and speed are determined to enable the prediction of the dynamic power exchange and then of the net energy demand useful to size the on-board source.

CHOOSING THE STYLE OF A NEW DESIGN - THE KEY SHIP DESIGN DECISION

As a former senior designer of naval vessels and, more recently, a leading researcher in ship design, the author has previously presented a description of the ship design process in terms of the important decisions a ship designer makes in concept exploration. Such decision are made consciously or unconsciously in order to produce a new design or, preferably, any design option. It has been contended in many publications that the first real decision that a ship designer makes, in order to proceed, is the selection of the “style” of the design study or of a specific design option. This term was adopted in order to cover, not just a host of design issues and standards implicit in a given study, but also, at this very initial step, the overall characteristics of any particular study. So the term style could be said to be doubly important. The current paper considers the nature of the early ship design process for complex multi-functional vessels and then retraces the origins of the particular use of the term, where it was seen as the last of the five elements in Brown and Andrews’ 1980 encapsulation of the ship design issues that matter to the naval architect, incorporated in the term “S to the 5th”. This leads on to consideration of the various aspects of design style, many of which could be considered “transversals” as they apply across the naval architectural sub-disciplines and to the component material sub-systems comprising a ship. One of the distinctive advantages of the architecturally driven ship synthesis or Design Building Block approach is that it can address many of these style issues in the earliest descriptions of an emergent design study. Examples, drawing on a range of built Royal Navy ship designs, are presented to show their top-level style characteristics, followed by a series of ship design research studies illustrating how the impact of specific component style aspects can be investigated in early stage ship design, using the UCL Design Building Block approach. Finally, recent research led investigations into integrating ship style into early stage ship design are summarized to demonstrate why the choice of “style” is seen to be The Key Ship Design Decision.

Editorial introduction: Design issues and practical questions for demand-oriented seed systems

This special issue is a collection of papers that brings together different views on and experiences with seed systems and reflects the breadth of perspectives within CGIAR and beyond. The contributions relate to the major challenges facing seed systems research and development in different contexts and for different crops. One point of agreement among these articles is the need for the development of varieties and the delivery of seeds to be more demand-orientated. This introduction reflects on the implications for CGIAR and affiliated breeding programmes which aim to accelerate varietal uptake and turnover and rely on more effective seed delivery. Here, we outline how the various contributions in this special issue relate to this agenda. We conclude that realism about which farming households can be served by current approaches to seed system development is needed and argue that a wider range of partnerships will be required to broaden the reach of seed systems.

Key Design Issues in the Construction Project: Conceptual and Detailed Design Review Phases

The Malaysian construction industry is among the highest ranked industries that contributes to accident and fatality rates. The Guidelines on Occupational Safety and Health in Construction Industry (Management) (OSHCIM) has introduced guidelines for design risk reduction in the construction industry. It involves determining root causes and mitigating the risk by control of the causation of accidents. The objective of this study is to identify the key design issues during the conceptual and detailed design review phases in the construction project. Although some of the design considerations have already been proposed by the OSCHIM guidelines, however, further implementation need to be diverse and versatile by considering the current design practices that are already being practiced by the industry practitioners. The methodology of this research involves document reviews, and a questionnaire survey that was used to collect answers from respondents in the construction industry. According to the results, the key design issues in the conceptual phase involve the site condition, environmental influences, ground or ground water condition, existing structure, demolition, services, adjacent to major infrastructure, traffic disruption, access for works, adjacent to other properties and projects, and site restriction. Moreover, those found in the detailed phase involve the mechanized construction system, installation of prefabrication components, ease of process, structural opening, edge line, fall hazard, accident prevention, layout optimization, ease of activities, permanent safety features, provision of access, and fall hazard. However, it is the duty of the construction industry practitioners to make sure that all other design issues are also included into their construction project risk analysis. As proposed by the OSHCIM guidelines, the review of design risks in the construction project should consider safety in all the stages: during construction, operation, maintenance, modification, and demolition. Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB)