Safety Equipment: How We Stay Safe on Site
As of writing this blog post, it’s Construction Safety Week! It is a week-long annual event highlighting the importance of safety and communicating procedures in order to protect employees and job sites from dangerous conditions. Worksite accidents can happen anywhere, even when you least expect it. This year’s theme is “Value Every Voice”. Our team at Trinity Subsurface performs safety checks and training audits in order to ensure our technicians know safe conditions. On top of this, every Trinity employee holds stop-work authorization, allowing them to voice concerns about safety conditions prior to performing any work. While utility locating might not always require the most intensive safety equipment, there are still a number of tools we use while out on-site to stay safe.
The most common safety equipment is our wearable PPE, usually consisting of hard hats, safety glasses, hearing protection, reflective vests, and gloves. Not only are they useful in keeping workers safe and seen, but they’re also useful identifiers for determining who is working at a job site and organizing safety procedures. Hard hats and glasses might not seem necessary when it comes to locating utilities, but they’re useful for protecting your head from the unexpected. On a personal anecdote, I was out on a job site taking photos as our technicians were duct rodding a sewer to detect the line easier with a ground penetrating radar system. As they were pushing it through the manhole from the reel, the metal duct rod twisted around and fell onto my helmet, which otherwise would’ve hit me in the head. While minor, this could’ve been a heavier piece of equipment that would’ve caused serious injury if I wasn’t wearing a hard hat.
When it comes to vacuum excavation, face shields are used to protect technicians operating the vacuum from flying debris, such as loosened rocks or dirt. They also prevent the swinging hot vacuum equipment from making direct contact with your face. Ear protection, such as earplugs or noise-canceling headphones, prevent hearing damage from the loud vacuum truck, jackhammering, core drilling and other nearby active construction performed by non-Trinity workers. Gloves are useful if our team has to touch active utilities or equipment, which we often do. We’re often connecting directly to utilities to receive a frequency signal, and the vacuum truck equipment can heat up when powered or while being used out in the sun. Gloves prevent damage to your hands. When it comes to our pipe services, gloves can be a barrier to protect your skin against potentially harmful contaminants. In these cases, we may use disposable rubber gloves in order to protect ourselves while we sanitize equipment that has entered a pipe. For further hand protection, we tend to use handled tools to open up manholes. Lifting a heavy manhole by hand can lead to pinching injuries.
Speaking of entering pipes, there may be times when we have to enter a confined space in order to perform services, such as entering a manhole for certain lining jobs. A confined space is defined by OSHA as a space “not necessarily designed for people” but large enough to fit a person in to perform work with limited means of entry or exit. These tight spaces can contain hazardous gas, live wires, and other hazards. In the situations our team would have to enter a confined space, we would monitor the air using a confined space gas meter. These meters measure the amount of hydrogen sulfide and oxygen within a confined space. If the meter doesn’t show safe conditions, we won’t enter the manhole unless we suit up with a supply of air. Alternatively, we could use a blower to add air until the meter shows safe conditions. We wear these meters while in these spaces to constantly monitor conditions where gas may be present.
There’s a variety of area and traffic control equipment we use to signify and protect working areas. Traffic cones, barriers, and signage are a staple of any work zone, providing an indicator of an area to stay away from. Manhole guards around open manholes are super important, providing access to anyone working in and around the manhole, but preventing dangerous accidental falls. Lastly, traffic control staff are helpful in directing the flow of traffic around work zones, supporting our technicians as they perform their work.Everyone has a powerful voice when it comes to safety. One person understanding a hazard can change standards used across entire teams. Knowing what safety equipment is available and what kind of conditions can exist, even when things may seem perfectly safe, is a great way to prevent injuries and death. Every voice that speaks up can make a difference. Our team at Trinity aims to be as safe as possible on any job site, even if that means stopping work until conditions are safe enough. Visit our website to find out more about the services we offer and our safety procedures. Stay safe out there!
