The Most Important Lesson

Hi, I’m John Lange. For 27 years, I was an electrician for the North Carolina Department of Transportation. I was responsible for maintaining three of the state’s most critical drawbridges. Now I am contracting electrical work for private and non-governmental drawbridges…at least I was when I wrote this. Who knows what future-me is up to now?

I’ve trained many bridge operators over the years, and like parents with more than one child…I’ve had a favorite (I’ll admit it even if they won’t). My favorite was John Bannor. Before becoming a bridge operator, Mr. Bannor had been a fighter pilot flying missions in Korea. He was an impressive individual. He was in his early seventies when I trained him, and he continued to be one of our best well into his eighties.

While his personality and charm played a role in my fondness for him, the simple truth is that Mr. Bannor was 100% honest with us, 100% of the time. Because of this, I have used him as an example in every bridge operator training for over a decade, illustrating the importance of honesty.

One of the most critical lessons I teach new operators is the absolute necessity of truth when reporting maintenance issues. Operators are human, and humans inevitably make mistakes. Even the best operator (and I consider myself among them) will slip up once in a while when operating bridges. These mistakes can result from distraction, exhaustion, or simple forgetfulness.

In fact, operator error accounts for approximately 20% of all trouble calls. It’s easy to forget a step and try to proceed when prerequisites aren’t met, or press the wrong button (raising instead of lowering), or turn a switch the wrong way. Mr. Bannor understood that while there is no shame in making a mistake, there is shame in lying to cover one up.

One beautiful Saturday morning, I was driving my mother to visit my sister when, as luck would have it, we were stopped by the bridge opening for a sailboat. From my vantage point at the front of the line, I saw one leaf of the bascule bridge begin to rise and then stop after a few degrees. A few seconds later, it rose a bit more, then stopped again, while the other leaf remained fully seated. At first, I wondered who would be performing maintenance on a Saturday, but then it struck me that there was a problem.

When I called the bridge house, Mr. Bannor answered and said he could not get one side of the bridge to raise. Then, quite abruptly he said, ‘I’ll call you back,’ and hung up. The bridge then started raising normally. I immediately knew what had happened, as I had done the same thing more than once. Mr. Bannor had turned the switch for raising one of the leaves in the wrong direction. After the opening was completed, I gave him some time and then called to check in. He told me right away that there was no real problem; he had indeed simply turned the switch in the wrong direction.

The fact that Mr. Bannor had made a mistake did not diminish my respect for him in the least. In fact, it gave me confidence that any problem he reported would be genuine, not a cover for his own error. The worst thing a bridge operator can do is to make an excuse and insist a maintenance issue exists when it was really just a simple mistake; this wastes time and undermines trust. Once this happens, every subsequent situation raises doubts…was this a legitimate problem or another error hidden by a lie?

Mr. Bannor passed away a few years ago and I sure do miss him. But I still use him and his honesty and integrity as an example every time I train. It’s such an important lesson, though unfortunately not all operators take it to heart. Some will still claim a problem occurred even after they realize it was a mistake on their part. They fail to understand that certain issues would have to be either repeatable or leave concrete evidence.

Covering up mistakes only erodes trust instead of saving face. With Mr. Bannor’s help, I will continue to guide new operators down the right path and hopefully help make maintenance more effective to the benefit of everyone who depends on bridges, whether on the road or on the water.