A near miss, near hit or close call is an unplanned event that has the potential to cause, but does not actually result in human injury, environmental or equipment damage, or an interruption to normal operation. OSHA defines a near miss as an incident in which no property was damaged and no personal injury was sustained, but where, given a slight shift in time or position, damage or injury easily could have occurred. Near misses also may be referred to as near accidents, accident precursors, injury-free events and, in the case of moving objects, near collisions. A near miss is often an error, with harm prevented by other considerations and circumstances. Causes There are factors for a near miss related to the operator, and factors related to the context. Fatigue is an example for the former. The risk of a car crash after a more than 24h shift for physicians has been observed to increase by 168%, and the risk of near miss by 460%. Factors relating to the context include time pressures, unfamiliar settings, and in the case of health care, diverse patients, and high patient-to-nurse staffing ratios. Reporting, analysis and prevention Most safety activities are reactive and not proactive. Many organizations wait for losses to occur before taking steps to prevent a recurrence. Near miss incidents often precede loss producing events but are largely ignored because nothing (no injury, damage or loss) happened. Employees are not enlightened to report these close calls as there has been no disruption or loss in the form of injuries or property damage. Thus, many opportunities to prevent the accidents that the organization has not yet had are lost. Recognizing and reporting near miss incidents can make a major difference to the safety of workers within organizations. In the heavy construction industry, near miss reporting software allows crews to find and document opportunities that help reduce safety risks as the software tracks, analyzes and calls attention to near misses on the job site to help prevent future incidents. History has shown repeatedly that most loss producing events (accidents) were preceded by warnings or near accidents, sometimes also called close calls, narrow escapes or near hits. In terms of human lives and property damage, near misses are cheaper, zero-cost learning opportunities (compared to learning from actual injury or property loss events) Getting a very high number of near misses is the goal as long