Components for Working at Height and the Fall Protection

Introduction:There are too many line items in life which you cannot calculate. Gravity is one among them. When you lose your balance and fall that’s called as Gravity at work. Many people life at risk got injured or died due to fall from height during the job. Fall from height results in serious injury than any other accidents in the industry. People suffer from broken bones, spinal injuries, paralysis and few more after the fall from height.

The funny thing is we all wear helmet while riding bikes, we wear seat belts when we drive cars, we will have many types of security devises to secure our families, we give lot of importance in our private life except at our work place where we need the protection most.

This is about the Fall Protection we often work at place where the job or activity to be completed in urgency. Fall protection can be practical and can be provided economically and importantly, it can save life.

We never construct the building without a blue print because the challenges are so complex. Fall Protection problems are also equally complex. But most projects begin without much taught to solve the problem, most of the workers works without fall protection in their own way. The solution of the problem begins with proper planning before the work commences at elevation. Each job site is different and each solution must be crafted according to the specific job site.

Fall Protection work plan is simply a Job Hazard Analysis. It’s like a blue print for a worker safety at site.

Fall Protection work plan 
1. Recognizes Hazard.
2. Provide solution to use the method of fall protection.
3. Identifies the work procedure.
4. Recognizes how much is the Horizontal Travel required and how much is the Vertical Travel required.
5. Recognizes what are the obstructions.
6. Recognizes the slippery surfaces or icy surfaces.

Please Note and Keep in mind Safety is Every One’s Responsibility.

There are Three Main components of Fall Protection
1. Fall Restraint System – which prevents the work from fall
2. Fall Arrest System – which stops a fall in progress

3. Work Procedure change – where conventional fall protection is impracticable to use.

Fall Restraint System is permanent or temporary Guard Rails. Using of pole belt resists the worker travel and eliminates the possibilities of fall. Mobile Elevated Work Platform (MEWP), Boom Lift, Scaffolding gives the safe work platform for working.

When it is impracticable to provide the Fall Restraint, the worker next method is to provide Fall Arrester where the worker body is arrested. Fall Arrester by means of Body Harness or Safety net.
Fall Arrester has three major components
1. Anchor Point.
2. Body Harness.
3. Connecting Devices.

Working together with these three components constitutes the Fall Arrest System. Anchor points should be closure to your work place, if not it will lead to swing fall hazard. Rope grab designed to lock on to the Life line when the fall occurs. Retractable lanyard has locking mechanism and it acts as belt arrest when the fall occurs. These are the devices designed to arrest the worker from free fall and eliminates the dangerous slack that developed using fixed life lines.

When it is impossible to use the Fall Restraint and Fall Arrester we need to modify the work procedure and it is an another means to provide fall protection.

Erecting the Scaffolding is dangerous while working at height. It is necessary to follow correct procedure when putting up scaffolds. A safety monitor is relatively new concept in the fall protection, where trained person will guide the worker continuously about the fall hazard exposed to.

Planning and training are extremely important, the supervisor overseas the situation that the worker what type of hazard they may encounter. The worker should undergo proper training, so that the experience will be brought down to proper work procedure by the supervisor.

Why Fall Protection?
Because it could Save Your LIFE.

Reference and Acknowledgement 
[1] Fall Protection Program by OSHA guidelines http://www.oshatrain.org
[2] Working At Height Guidelines, Version II, 21st September 2011 http://www.mic.ul.ie/adminservices/policies

Civil Engineering History

• In the beginning, Civil Engineering included all engineers that did not practice military engineering; said to have begun in 18th century France.

• First “Civil Engineer” was an Englishman, John Smeaton in 1761.

• Civil engineers have saved more lives than all the doctors in history — development of clean water and sanitation systems.

• Henry H. White, first KY Civil Engineering Graduate from Bacon (Georgetown) College in 1840.

• Fall of 1886, “State College” (UK) established civil engineering degree.

• John Wesley Gunn of Lexington received first Civil Engineering degree from A & M College (UK) in 1890.

ORIGINS OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
Civil engineering has evolved tremendously in aspects relating to building, designing and maintaining the world’s built and natural environments. Historically, the term ‘civil engineering’ did not exist. It is only recently that engineers whose duties were civil and non- military were categorized as civil engineers to differentiate them from military engineers. A military engineer is one who makes ‘machines of war’. In ancient times the bridge, waterways, fortifications and machines of war were all projects also projects undertaken by the military engineer. Kings, Queens, Emperors or Pharaohs required these military building services from their engineers in order to build massive structures that created a powerful and imposing image of themselves. This was the ultimate form of self-promotion. The reason the ‘civil’ and ‘military’ engineers were grouped as one, was because the techniques of designing these projects were similar and one who worked on military construction projects also worked on civil projects. Also the structures such as roads, dams, buildings and bridges facilitated for the military agendas of certain rulers. Definitely, before the term civil engineer was coined, civil engineers were in existence. Millennia ago when the pyramids of the Mayan and Egyptian empires were building pyramids, the people designing and supervising the construction of the pyramids must have been an engineer. Certainly, those endowed with the responsibility of devising ways to solve the day to day problems of construction, transportation, water irrigation, city planning were engineers. The engineers of the past often worked on technical problems of their day by using mechanics, available materials and technicians of the day and often worked in areas that ranged from mechanical, military inventions to architecture, which involved the design of aesthetic structure and the overall shape and form of structures.

Taken from book named – “An Introduction to Civil Engineering” by Valdengrave Okumu

Civil Engineering Home

Engineering is a term applied to the profession in which a knowledge of the mathematical and natural sciences, gained by study, experience, and practice, is applied to the efficient use of the materials and forces of nature. Engineers are the ones who have received professional training in pure and applied science.Before the middle of the 18th century, large-scale construction work was usually placed in the hands of military engineers. Military engineering involved such work as the preparation of topographical maps, the location, design, and construction of roads and bridges; and the building of forts and docks; see Military Engineering below. In the 18th century, however, the term civil engineering came into use to describe engineering work that was performed by civilians for nonmilitary purposes.

Civil engineering is the broadest of the engineering fields. Civil engineering focuses on the infrastructure of the world which include Water works, Sewers, Dams, Power Plants, Transmission Towers/Lines, Railroads, Highways, Bridges, Tunnels, Irrigation Canals, River Navigation, Shipping Canals, Traffic Control, Mass Transit, Airport Runways, Terminals, Industrial Plant Buildings, Skyscrapers, etc. Among the important subdivisions of the field are construction engineering, irrigation engineering, transportation engineering, soils and foundation engineering, geodetic engineering, hydraulic engineering, and coastal and ocean engineering.

Civil engineers build the world’s infrastructure. In doing so, they quietly shape the history of nations around the world. Most people can not imagine life without the many contributions of civil engineers to the public’s health, safety and standard of living. Only by exploring civil engineering’s influence in shaping the world we know today, can we creatively envision the progress of our tomorrows.

Civil Engineering Disciplines

This section deals with the civil engineering fields.As a Civil Engineer a vast world of imagination and dreams are opened to us.The Field of civil engineering is so vast that one cant limit itself to any particular field and excel without having a proper knowledge of other related fields.

To Conclude we can say that “Civil Engineering is a Renaissance field that requires the knowledge of many disciplines. ”

Below we have a list of disciplines one can choose from:

* Bridge Engineering

* Construction engineering

* Environmental engineering

* Fire protection engineering

* Geotechnical engineering

* General engineering

* Hydraulic engineering

* Materials science

* Piles Engineering

* Structural engineering

* Surveying

* Timber Engineering

* Transportation engineering

* Water resources engineering