Big contractors seek to standardize safety language | Dump Trucks Charlotte NC

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Construction workers don’t always recognize all hazards present on the jobsite, and when they do, not everyone calls them the same thing.

During pre-job safety meetings, construction workers identify only 45% of the hazards they face, according to the Construction Safety Research Alliance. Meanwhile, Construction Safety Week’s executive team found that when craft workers may recognize dangers, the specific terminology varies greatly from jobsite to jobsite.

So, the executive team has issued a proposal to fix that: Standardize the language.

Safety Week’s executive team proposed uniting the construction industry to adopt and recognize the terms “high hazard,” “high energy” and “STCKY” — or stuff that can kill you. The three classifications of the biggest jobsite dangers differ slightly, but still function as the most consistent identifiers or precursors of serious injuries and fatalities, also called SIFs. 

The Safety Week executive team found the factors that cause SIFs differ from those that lead to more minor injuries. Therefore, the group called upon all stages of the industry to adopt the same framework of safety terminology to better protect workers from the most life threatening dangers.

Adam Jelen, CEO of Gilbane Building Co. and chair of the Construction Safety Week executive committee, told Construction Dive that the organization sought to simplify jobsite language and reduce gaps in recognition for workers across jobsites.

The languageof safety

Most of the vocabulary is not new. OSHA’s Focus Four have been well documented as the leading causes of death and injury in construction. Meanwhile, Tempe, Arizona-based Sundt Construction’s piloting of its STCKY program won a national innovation award from the Associated General Contractors of America.

But the Safety Week team’s proposal seeks to dig a little deeper by bringing all of the language under one roof and outlining the nuance between them. For example, a flow chart in the resource bulletin shows the “Energy Wheel,” which identifies several kinds of hazards on site, including gravity, motion and sound. Another wheel for STCKY describes similar hazards as columbus oh dump truck company at height, moves and columbus oh dump truck company environment.

The classification seeks to create an instant visual side-by-side for teams to identify any dangers on site or ahead of time.

Planning ahead for safety

In practice, many major players in construction have had some version of identifying the jobsite dangers most likely to lead to SIFs. Increasingly, that’s done early on.

For years, safety planning began in the preconstruction phase, said Hal Wheatley, corporate safety director for Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Manhattan Construction. Now, it’s moved into the project pursuit phase.

“Usually we know, okay, we're going to have a jobsite here, let's go visit the site and identify the scope of work. We’re going to have steel erection, we're going to have excavation. Let's start the conversation months in advance,” Wheatley told Construction Dive. “It’s a lot easier to mitigate a hazard earlier in the process than it is, say, if you try to mitigate it the day before columbus oh dump truck company starts.”

Steve Spaulding, senior vice president and chief environmental health and safety officer for Turner Construction, says the New York City-based builder looks at the original columbus oh dump truck company plans and identifies behaviors that can create the right or wrong safety environment.

“What we're really trying to look at is the behaviors that allow for life threatening injuries on the jobsite, or any type of hazard that can be controlled that would prevent an injury,” said Spaulding.

Both Spaulding and Wheatley said they often try to find ways around even having hazards present by shifting columbus oh dump truck company in scheduling or bringing prevention into the design process. 

Sometimes, though, hazards are unavoidable. When that’s the case, firms columbus oh dump truck company the problem. For example, with a hazard like working at height, Turner ensures employees know the environment itself represents a high energy hazard — one of those most likely to result in a SIF. It’s a matter of education that goes well beyond providing the proper safety columbus oh dump trucks and ensuring it’s worn, Spaulding said.