Construction Industry Scaffolders

Each years falls account for a large percent of fatalities in the construction industry. These citations cover general fall protection. They do not cover falls from scaffolds, aerial lifts, steel erection, etc. Those areas have their own fall protection rules. 

Although there is a trend in the construction industry towards specialised plant to meet a particular need, the most common material at present employed to provide access scaffolding is scaffold tube and couplers. Large-scale or difficult projects are best carried out by experts but there is a very large amount of scaffold erection of the smaller type in short-term use which can be quickly and safely erected by craftsmen who are to work on them, provided they have been trained in the basic techniques and requirements of these Regulations and the British Standard Code of Practice . 

Some new applications were showcased at the American Composites Manufacturers Association annual conference, Composites Polycon 2007, in Tampa, Florida. These included scaffolding for the construction industry and a new steel-free concrete deck (see Fig. 12.14). Creative Pultrusions Inc. has developed a tough, hght and more corrosion resistant composite sheet piling system (Fig. 12.15) named SuperLoc profiles. These profiles consist of polyester resin matrix with more than 100 fibreglass rovings in the core, plus two phes of continuous strand mat. SuperLoc so far has been utilized in more than 20 shorelines in the United States (Black, 2004). 

Falls from a height are the most common cause of serious injury or death in the construction industry. The Work at Height Regulations require that suitable and sufficient steps be taken to prevent any person falling a distance that would be liable to cause personal injury and specifies that the maximum unprotected gap between the toe and guard rail of a scaffold is 470 mm. This implies the use of an intermediate guard rail or infill. It also specifies requirements for personal suspension equipment and means of arresting falls (such as safety nets). 

A variety of ring-fused systems have been prepared by reaction of pentafluoropyridine and various tetrafluoropyridine systems with difunctional nitrogen nucleophiles. For example, tetrahydropyrido[2,3-Z ]pyrazine and imidazopyridine systems can be prepared by reaction of pentafluoropyridine and appropriate tetrafluoropyridine systems with suitable diamines. The [5,6] and [6,6]-ring-fused systems are also useful substrates for further nucleophilic substitution processes and, consequently, act as versatile scaffolds for the construction of a range of functionalized annelated systems (Fig. 8.10). Of course, such scaffolds are of great interest to the life science industries where access to novel heterocyclic skeletal diversity is a major factor driving the discovery of new chemical entities in lead generation. 

One of the most common ways people understand safety is through personal protective equipment (PPE). PPE is so dominant a feature of our industry that it even makes a key contribution to the social construction of the construction worker - the hard hat and yellow vest assigning identity and associated status, easily recognisable by the rest of the world. On sites, shared understandings between the workforce enable PPE to communicate even more harnesses for scaffolders and roofers, orange vests for banksmen, blue or black hard hats for foremen and supervisors. It is also by its very nature highly visible PPE is meant to be seen. 

Falls in the workplace are the leading cause of death to workers this also includes workers within the Service Industry. Thus, the need for fall protection in workplaces when workers are performing their jobs is definitely a requirement. Fall protection must be provided so that workers can concentrate on the job tasks without any fear of falling. Requirements relating to fall protection, as described in this chapter, do not apply to scaffolds, cranes and derricks, ladders and stairways, or electrical power transmission and distribution, each of which has its own requiranents. The major components of fall protection, described herein, are for installation, construction, and proper use of body harnesses and belts, lanyards, and lifelines, and the reqnire-ments for the training of fall protection. 

L Ladders. Ladders, steps, scaffolding and other means of access are widely used in industry and commerce. Working from ladders and temporary scaffolding accounts for some 10 per cent of industrial and construction accidents, many of them fatal. Poor equipment, badly maintained, erected and used by untrained personnel, with insufficient supervision, are the main causes of falls. 

---