Safety engineers develop procedures and system designs that protect people from illness and injury and property from damage. They combine their engineering and health and safety knowledge to ensure that machinery, furniture, and other products do not harm people or damage property. They maintain and apply their knowledge of current health and safety policies, regulations, and industrial processes and review plans and specifications of new machinery and equipment to ensure they meet safety standards.
Safety engineers identify and correct potential hazards by inspecting facilities, machinery, and safety equipment and evaluate various industrial control mechanisms’ effectiveness. They ensure buildings or products comply with health and safety regulations, paying careful attention after conducting an inspection that requires changes. They direct and oversee the installation of safety devices on machinery, and review employee safety programs, recommending necessary improvements as needed. Safety engineers need a bachelor's degree in environmental safety or engineering.
What responsibilities are common for Safety Engineer jobs?
- Perform audits and report the effectiveness of the system safety program.
- Support launch vehicle design and development to ensure that customer and internal goals for safety, mission success, and performance are met.
- Ability to develop schedules, manage budget and complete work according to the developed schedule.
- Briefing safety of the program at technical reviews and as part of the safety approval process.
- This position may include launch campaign support at remote launch sites both domestic and international.
- Exercises latitude in determine technical objectives of assignments, and make decisions and recommendations that are recognized as authoritative.
- Support incident investigations with business units, determine root causes and drive corrective actions.
- Guide successful completion of major engineering programs, or conceives research in areas of considerable scope and complexity supporting the development and production of products and services.
- Select appropriate methods, techniques, and evaluation criteria to resolve complex engineering issues.
- Work with test and tactical operating and maintenance procedures to assure the proper administrative controls are in place.
- Work across all integrated product teams and lines to properly eliminate hazards or provide effective controls.
- Implement occupational safety programs and serve as EHS interface with business units.
- Interface with software developers and systems engineers in support of verification.
