Emergency Triage Flowchart

Three questions. Run within five minutes of any out-of-schedule request. If all three answers are "no," the request is not an emergency.

Companion to: Fix the System, Chapter 10. Who uses it: the shift supervisor. Every shift, every request. Where posted: at every supervisor station, at the maintenance shop entry, and on every crew lead's clipboard.

THE REQUEST ARRIVES

Every request for work to be started outside the planned/scheduled cycle goes through this flowchart first. Includes requests from operators, engineers, managers, vendors, and anyone else who asks for immediate maintenance action.

QUESTION 1 — SAFETY

Is there imminent risk of injury, environmental release, or regulatory violation if the work is not performed within hours?

• YES → EMERGENCY. Route to immediate response. Maintenance supervisor authorizes crew dispatch. Plant manager notified within the shift.
• NO → continue to Question 2.

Imminent means minutes to hours, not days. A fume hood that needs rebalancing is not Question-1-yes. A leaking chlorine line is.

QUESTION 2 — CATASTROPHIC FAILURE

Has an asset failed catastrophically, or is it actively failing, with significant risk to production, capital, or downstream systems?

• YES → EMERGENCY. Route to immediate response. Plant manager notified.
• NO → continue to Question 3.

"Catastrophic" means failure that produces cascading consequences — extended line-down (days, not hours), capital-level equipment damage, or downstream process disruption. Worn components are not catastrophic. A shattered shaft or seized bearing at 3 a.m. is.

"Actively failing" means the asset is currently degrading and further runtime makes the failure worse. A bearing with rising temperature and vibration over the last 30 minutes is active. A bearing that "might fail next week" is not.

QUESTION 3 — REGULATORY DEADLINE

Is there a regulatory compliance deadline within the next 48-72 hours that cannot otherwise be met?

• YES → EMERGENCY. Route to immediate response. Plant manager and EHS notified.
• NO → continue below.

"Regulatory" means externally enforced — EPA, OSHA, state, municipal inspection, permit renewal. Not internal audit. Not customer-driven deadline.

"Cannot otherwise be met" means the deadline would be missed if this were routed to normal planning. If next week's scheduling meeting can still get it done in time, it's not an emergency.

IF ALL THREE ANSWERS ARE "NO"

THIS IS NOT AN EMERGENCY.

Route the request to one of two paths:

Path A — Break-in absorbed by reserve. If the 15-20% reserved capacity can absorb the request without displacing committed work, approve it as a within-week break-in. No displacement, no escalation. Supervisor approves.

Path B — Planning queue. If reserve cannot absorb it, the request goes to the next planning/scheduling meeting. Respond to the requester: "This doesn't meet the emergency criteria. It will be reviewed at the Monday scheduling meeting and scheduled for next week."

Do NOT route to "just squeeze it in." That is the path that destroys the cycle.

AFTER AN EMERGENCY IS DECLARED

1. Maintenance supervisor dispatches the crew. 2. Plant manager notified within the shift (or next morning if it's a middle-of-night call and the situation is contained). 3. Displaced work is formally rescheduled with written notice to operations via the frozen-zone escalation log. 4. Within 48 hours: post-emergency debrief. 15 minutes, 4 questions, one or two improvements into the planning queue. 5. Log the emergency in the monthly emergency tally. Target: 2-4 real emergencies per month for a typical mid-size plant.

THE FIVE FALSE-URGENCY PATTERNS

If a request answers "no" to all three questions but the requester insists it's urgent, it is almost certainly one of these five patterns. Respectfully name the pattern to the requester:

1. "I need this by Friday." Self-imposed deadline. → Planning queue. 2. "This is going to break soon." That's a Chapter 5 notification. → Planning queue (unless Q2 applies). 3. Supervisor-to-supervisor direct ask. Bypasses the triage. → Back through supervisor, then through the flowchart. 4. Operator's favorite technician. Bypasses the CMMS. → Log it as a notification; route to the flowchart. 5. Executive-attention request. Political urgency. → Plant manager decides whether to escalate; otherwise planning queue.

TRACKING

The supervisor on each shift logs every request that went through the flowchart. Weekly review:

Monthly targets:

• Total emergencies (all three questions used): 2-4 per month
• Break-ins absorbed by reserve: 15-25 per month (varies with plant size)
• Requests routed to planning queue: highest volume, and should be trending UP for the first quarter of the installation as the plant learns to self-filter

From Fix the System by Ivan Getov. Companion to Chapter 10: Emergencies and Break-In. getov.xyz/toolkit/fix-the-system/ch10/emergency-triage-flowchart. Free. No email required.