2012 Los Angeles Regional

[Pedman585]

Ran the practice field on Friday, saw one major problem, most of the teams were bringing their bots to the field powered up! Many times without the control station on, tethered or even in close proximity to the robot.

Also, had an two injuries, one when a student placed his hand inside an energized robot and had two of his fingers seriously lacerated-NOT WEARING GLOVES, and his team members did not feel it was necessary to power-down the robot!?

Another student twisted his knee on the practice field, no one thought tell the volunteers running the field, as there were three teams on the practice field at the time. I suspended all operations and asked all robots on the field to power-down and leave the field. The student was ok after being attended to by an EMT.
We all need to do better than this, and think about our Operational Safety Plans, Manuals and training.