Janet Sellery, the Stratford Festival of Canada’s health and safety manager, is the 2007 COS Safety Manager of the Year!

When patrons take their seats at the Stratford Theatre they are transported to another time and place, witness tempests and sword fights, epic battles, and experience a full range of human emotions.

But the people who help stage these fantasies need to ensure they aren’t risking their own safety for our entertainment.

To mount the elaborate and awe inspiring productions we see at Stratford, there are dozens of craftspeople and artisans, stagehands, administrative staff, actors and directors and a team of creative people working off stage to produce top quality and artistically meaningful entertainment.

Have you ever considered the hazards and controls involved with twelve people in gold flight suits tap-dancing on the wings of an airplane over a cloud of fog?  This is an issue that our Technical Director, Elissa Horscroft, had to resolve so that this spectacular moment could be included in the curtain call of My One and Only at the Avon Theatre.  Try to imagine a business where these kinds of issues are common.

A bright light for safety

The readers have spoken — and the COS digital edition is a big hit!

Readers from coast to coast (and overseas) and from a wide range of industries are letting us know how much they appreciate our efforts to keep them informed about health and safety news and products.

Please let us know what you think and we'll publish your letters too! Just send an email to editor Todd Phillips at This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it .

The Readers Speak

 “The digital version of COS is an excellent use of technology. While everyone else is still struggling to convert documents to PDF, you’ve gone miles beyond the readers’ expectations. Brilliant! I love it. What you’re doing is in line with what tech companies do. I think this is a big deal for a publication with a more industrial readership.”
—Shannon Nicholson  
Technical Support Specialist
Hydro Ottawa  Limited
Safety, Environment and Training

“The new digital edition is really remarkable. I think it’s the way to understand the use of technology: no space limitations, in your hand zoom tools — I love it. Thanks for the efforts.”
— Claudio Piga  
Environment, Safety and Health Manager
ITT Flygt Canada

“Great job, really slick.”
—Maureen Moffat
General Motors, St. Catharines Powertrain
Health and Safety

Don Sayers has been in the training game for longer than he’d care to admit. And he’s learned a thing or two along the way about what makes training effective.  

Sayers, the principal force behind Don Sayers & Associates, presented a three-hour workshop on effective safety training at the CSSE event in Victoria, B.C.

Wandering effortlessly across the stage, Sayers is clearly comfortable when he’s teaching and training — even training trainers. Get him talking about safety training and adult learning, and you’d better be ready for a far-reaching discussion.

Workers exposed to violence
on the job in Canada, study finds

A new Statistics Canada study finds that almost 20 per cent of all incidents of violent victimization, including physical assault, sexual assault and robbery occurred while the victim was at work in 2004.

The study: Criminal Victimization in the Workplace, was the first such study conducted in Canada, and used self-reported data from 24,000 households that took part in the General Social Survey. The report’s authors say the vast majority of these workplace incidents, 71 per cent, were classified as physical assaults.