Posts Tagged ‘fall’

Fall from mobile tower scaffold

Sunday, April 27th, 2008

See the following case from www.safetynews.co.uk.   

England
Mobile tower platform plunge
In June 2007, an employee of West Sussex company RH Phillips & Sons Ltd fell from the top platform of an unguarded mobile tower scaffold, fracturing his ribs.
Investigation found the persons who set up the scaffolding tower were not suitably competent to erect or dismantle the equipment, the scaffolding itself was unfit for use in a work activity, and that the injured worker had received no training or instruction from his employer on its use.
The company was fined £2,500 and ordered to pay £1,600 costs having breached the Work at Height Regulations 2005.
21st April 2008.

 

Mobile tower scaffold is a common equipment or structure used in workplaces, in particular construction worksites. One of the most common unsafe acts while using mobile tower scaffold is riding of the scaffold while it is being moved. If the scaffold bums into debris or obstacles on the ground there is a relatively high probability that the worker riding the scaffold will fall off the scaffold. This is especially so if the mobile tower scaffold is not erected by competent persons. See this HSE guide for some guidance on mobile scaffold.

Fall restraint or fall arrest on mobile elevated work platform?

Monday, April 21st, 2008

My last post on fall from a work platform on a forklift indicates that fall restraint should be used when working on a mobile elevated work platform. I need to highlight that a fall arrest might still be feasible if a sufficiently strong anchor is available.

Australian and New Zealand Standard, AS 1891.4:2000, indicates that if

  • the anchorage has ultimate strength of less than 12kN then a restraint shall be used
  • the anchorage has ultimate strength of 12kN or more but less than 15kN, either restraint or limited free fall (less than 600mm of fall) shall be used
  • the anchorage has ultimate strength of 15kN or more then fall arrest situation is allowed

Fall from forklift

Thursday, April 17th, 2008

A worker fell from a non-integrated work platform attached to a forklift while trying to pry a jammed sliding door (estimated to be about 4-5m high). Click here for the OSH Alert from Ministry of Manpower, Singapore. Apparrently the worker lost his balance.

He was most probably not using a fall protection harness with a lanyard attached to a suitable anchor. The lanyard, as advised by the OSH alert, should be short enough to act as a restraint. However, particular attention should be given to the training of staff so that they know when is a restraint appropriate and when does it becomes a fall arrest situation. They must know how to check, use and maintain their fall protection equipment. In Singapore, most organisations are not paying much attention to the need for formal training in this area.

However, a more fundamental question in this case is, “Is it reasonable to use a non-integrated work platform in this case?” HSE has good guidance for the above question. Click here for the guidance note. Paragraph 13a seems pretty relevant to this case.

Suspension Trauma Syndrome

Thursday, April 17th, 2008

Suspension trauma syndrome is thrust into the limelight as a result of a HSE publication in 2000. The HSE publication was initiated after a 1999 incident in Australia where “a rescuee on a training exercise took his full body weight on a harness, he felt “excruciating pain”, became nauseated and unable to react or communicate with he rescuer.”
However, 8 years on and there are still much unclarity on how to deal with suspension trauma syndrome and there are numerous variations to the name used. Here are some variations to the name: “harness induced pathology”, “orthothatic shock while suspended”, “orthostatic intolerance”, “harness hang syndrome”. One of the reasons for the variations is that even if no trauma is involved persons being suspended in vertical position might still suffer the syndrome.

In terms of immediate respons, some recommend that the patients that were suspended for more than 30 minutes should be kept in a seated position for a period of time, but others do not think that this is necessary. Hopefully the medical people come to a consensus on this soon.

HSE inspection of fall and trips in construction

Thursday, March 6th, 2008

HSE recently made an extensive checks on fall in trips in the construction industry in UK. They gave some good photos of good and bad practices. The photos will be very useful for trainings and promotional material. Click here for the photos.

HSE also produced a 5min toolbox talk video on fall and trip in construction. You can download it on HSE website.