ALL NPPS Members

[Torre Wenaus <wenaus AT gmail.com>]

---------- Forwarded message ---------

From: Allen, Leesa <leesa AT bnl.gov>
Date: Fri, Jan 15, 2021 at 4:23 PM
Subject: COVID-19 Protocols

On behalf of Brandon Thorne 

 

To All Physics Department Supervisors,

It is imperative that we emphasize the need for everyone to remain vigilant about the COVID protocols: wearing masks, social distancing, and keeping hands clean and away from your face.

The Department faces an increasingly risky phase of our operations. The rate of infections in our community has been surging and currently 116.3 daily new cases per 100,000 people. (see map below). In addition to the risk of infection that individual staff members face, there are other significant risks that an entire work group might be crippled due to the infection of individuals within the work group and the need for close contacts (15 min within 6-ft in a 24-hr period) within the group to quarantine for 10 days. These situations have already occurred at the Laboratory and within major departments such as Facilities and Operations and the C-AD water group. The impact of this scenario increases as we move closer to the restart of RHIC operations and bringing users on site.

 

Again: It is imperative that we emphasize the need for everyone to remain vigilant about the COVID protocols: wearing masks, social distancing, and keeping hands clean and away from your face.

To reduce the risk of our staff and to our operations, I would like for us to reinforce the following controls in mitigating the risks of COVID-19:

•        It is mandatory to wear your mask in any Nuclear and Particle Physics Directorate facility. The mask should be properly worn, which is over both your mouth and nose with an appropriate seal to protect yourself and other staff members around.

•        Remind your staff if they feel sick in any way, please stay home.  Encourage your staff to get tested if they feel sick or they have been in close contact with someone that has COVID-19.  Staff should not come into work if someone in the household has tested positive. 

•        Please continue to be mindful of reducing the number of staff on site to only those needed to accomplish the work safely. Plan the work in a way that keeps the number of people working within separate groups small and minimizes the interaction between these groups.

•        Minimize the need for staff to share rides in vehicles when working in the field.  Also, ensure that staff do not share vehicles when leaving for lunch or other breaks.

•        Ensure that staff working indoors have at least six feet of spacing between workstations and minimize the number of staff working in the same space.

•        Consider changing the work schedule to minimize the population density of staff members. In other words, spread out or rearrange the schedule to reduce the number of people on site at any one time.  Also, encourage people to leave the site once their work assignments are complete.

•        Emphasize to staff members that what happens outside of work can affect work on the site.  Encourage your staff to be vigilant about wearing their masks, maintaining their distance, keeping their hands clean, and minimizing physical contact with people outside their families when at home.

•        Consider what might happen if a member of your work group becomes infected.  What happens if the entire work group must quarantine? What work might be impacted? What can be done now to minimize this impact?  Can we plan now to avoid a major programmatic impact?

As a team, it is imperative that we all consider the measures that we are taking very carefully to reduce the risk of infection and adverse impact to our operations.  We all need to continue to remain vigilant and continue to remain optimistic as we continue limited operations at the Laboratory.  Let us continue to take care of each other, but more important please take care of yourselves.

Please let me know if you have questions.

Regards,

Brandon

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Brandon L. Thorne CSM, CSPO, RBLP-T

Deputy Directorate Chief Operating Officer

Nuclear and Particle Physics Directorate

Brookhaven National Laboratory

Tel:  631-344-7466

E-mail:  Bthorne AT bnl.gov

 

 

 

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