Matter of Life and Death: Lack of traceability can turn magic into mayhem

摘要

Is the headline an exaggeration or reality? I hope it's an exaggeration. But it might not be far from the truth. In too many cases, lack of traceability is a daily occurrence. I'm not talking about the traceability of a batch or lot of product. I'm referring to the traceability of test instruments to a national standard, industry-accepted consensus standard or natural-occurring phenomena. According to the International Vocabulary of Basic and General Terms in Metrology (VIM), traceability is a property of the result of a measurement and provides the ability to relate the measurement result to stated references through an unbroken chain of comparisons, each having stated uncertainties.1 This can be kind of a mouthful for those not making a living in the metrology or calibration fields. Let me give you an example and see if it helps.