Capital Equipment News April 2021

WORK-AT-HEIGHT

Mitigating the dangers of working at height In 2018, over 8 300 accidents occurred at construction sites in South Africa, according to the Federated Mutual Assurance Company. Some 10% of the more than 1 200 accidents in the Western Cape alone involved falls from height. Capital Equipment News explores the causes of these accidents, the technologies to mitigate them and the legislation in place to prevent them. By Mark Botha .

E volution Height Safety CEO Johan Vorster says many fall-from-height (FFH) accidents are caused by the ‘human factor’. He says that, once workers become accustomed to working at heights and to their safety equipment, they often become complacent and neglect the crucial fundamentals of safety. “This includes regular inspection of safety equipment, fatigue management, adherence to safe working procedure, regular reviews of risks assessments and holding routine ‘toolbox talks’ prior to commencing work, as a critical safety element.” Gravity Access director Hein Stapelberg adds untrained personnel, incorrect use of safety equipment, and the use of substandard equipment as common causes of accidents of this nature while, to Eazi Access regional GM: North Region Shaun Changuion, many recorded FFH accidents in the construction sector are due to tripping and slipping. “This risk is mitigated drastically when mobile elevator working platforms (MEWPs) are used for working at heights, as opposed to scaffolds.” MEWPs versus scaffolds He cites the International Powered Access Federation’s (IPAF’s) Global MEWP Safety Report for 2016 – 2018, which indicates that fewer than 250 fatal falls

from height occurred where access was gained by means of MEWPs in 25 countries over this period. “Although one single fatality is one too many, this figure is very low compared to over a thousand fatalities involving scaffolding over the same period, in South Africa alone.” In terms of productivity, he says it can take several employees more than a day to erect scaffolding for work at a certain height, while a MEWP can be raised to this height within minutes, saving the process plant or production line the operational cost of equipment down-time. “I recently saw scaffolding stretching to a height of about 50 m at one of our heavy industrial sites in Mpumalanga. By the time the employees had climbed to the top, they

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