Safety News Item – 11/30/07 – Facility Safety Management Z 359 Code Article


Dr. J. Nigel Ellis co-authored an article with Bruce Simms, fall protection director of Industrial Turn Around Corporation, for Facilities Safety Management magazine concerning the newly adopted ANSI Z359 Fall Protection Code.
The focus of the article is the new training requirements, specifically the need to train workers on how to properly perform a rescue after a fall.

Safety News Item – 11/16/07 – FP Equipment Article


An article by Katherine Torres in teh June 2007 issue of Occupational Hazards entitled, “New Frontiers in Fall Protection Equipment” asks the question:
As falls remain one of the leading caues of traumatic occupational deaths, companies specializing in fall protection equipment are stepping up to the plate to make sure their products utilize the latest technology to meet proposed ANSI standards. But is it enough?

Quoted in the article is Dr. J. Nigel Ellis states that while comfort of fall protection has become an important selling point, it doesn’t necessarily mean that workers will use the equipment. Dr. Ellis states that “out of 1,000 people who die from falls, a substantial portion of them were wearing the so-called comfortable harness” but were not tied off.

Safety News Item – 11/09/07 – OSH Reporter discusses FP on Trucks


The November 1, 2007 issue of BNA, Inc.’s Occupational Safety & Health Reporter Vol.34:No.43, on pages 969-970 includes an article entitled, “Covering Flatbed Truck Loads Hazardous for Drivers, But Dangers Largely Unrecognized”.
The article is based upon the reporter’s discussion with Dr. J. Nigel Ellis concerning the fall hazards associated with drivers covering flatbed loads and goes into detail about Dr. Ellis’ field research into the hazards of falls from truck.
Dr. Ellis sums up the situation – “There are so many fall opportunities here and nothing to help them.”
OSHA declined Dr. Ellis’ notion of issuing a safety hazard bulletin on the situation, but noted that the general industry fall protection standard will be on the 2008 regulatory agenda.

Expert Dr. Nigel Ellis Discusses Legal Issues Raised by Falls in the Workplace


Legal issues raised by falls in the workplace.

Falls are divided into surface or same level falls that involve slipping and elevated falls that are losses of balance with an exposure from only one quarter inch to up to thousands of feet. Focusing on the elevated fall; the average work fall death is from approximately 15 feet. Injurious falls cover the spectrums of height and location. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics 90% of accidental fall deaths at work are from elevation. Construction deaths from height occur at rates of 1% at 6 feet, 8% at 10 feet,………up to 40% at 30 feet or more.

In order of frequency, most work falls occur from three sources:
1.Roofs
2. Ladders
3. Scaffolds

OSHA mandates some general rules concerning falls from height relating to guardrails, floors and hole covers and personal protection equipment. OSHA construction related rules further relate to personal fall arrest and safety nets with the presumption of feasibility.

OSHA regulations used as standards of care derive from the premises duty to provide a safe place for invitees and independent contractors, including truck drivers and delivery personnel, by “controlling employers” who are required to provide not only employees with a safe work place but to non-employees as well. This broader obligation is conferred by paragraph 5(a)(2) of the OSHA Act (www.osha.gov). This clause requires the controlling employer to meet all regulations of the OSHA Act for the protection of all parties on a work site.

It is possible for the employer or building owner to be responsible for a workers’ injury or death beyond the worker’s compensation claim. Generally speaking, an injured worker’s cause of action for a personal injury suffered at work is limited by law to worker’s compensation unless certain conditions exist. These certain conditions may include, for example, a general contractor or the owner who has control of the worksite may be liable if there is a duty, contractual or otherwise to provide a safe premise for subcontractor employees to work.

A non-employer such as a general contractor or owner can be sued for negligence by anyone injured on a worksite if there is evidence of poorly maintained equipment or premises, or if there was insufficient training and a test of knowledge followed by observation of the work.

An injury on a worksite due to failure of a product constitutes strict liability. Liability rests with the supplier who provided or labeled the product.

Premises liability of a building owner or manager applies if an injury occurs on a property and the standard of care to an invitee is not met. The standard of care on private property may be based on OSHA regulations, a building code violation or electrical or fire code violation.

Certain states have stricter standards of care, such as Texas where gross negligence can be claimed against a direct employer when an employee death has occurred.
Further, Ohio, West Virginia and New Mexico permit actions against the direct employer if the following is proven: 1. there was an employer intentional act or omission reasonably expected to result in injury; 2. employer expected that action or omission to result in injury or disregarded the consequences and 3. the act or omission has caused the injury.
Liability can be imposed in some cases by specific laws, such as scaffolding laws of New York (Labor Law 240. et seq.) Under this statute owners and general contractors can be found liable even if they exercised no control over the worksite and the law directs that the mere availability of safety devices is not adequate to relieve owners/general contractors of liability if they do not provide protection against the hazards entailed in the performance of the work.

The most typical work injury fall case is one involving negligence to an independent contractor by an owner or prime contractor.

Summarizing:

Employer-related falls occur in many ways and, depending upon the circumstances, causes of action may arise beyond workers’ compensation and premises liability. OSHA standards of care are applicable through section 5(a)(2) to injury cases of independent contractors and other invitees on properties.

Falls, including those for which others are liable in part or in whole, can occur at any time, to any one at any place. A proper evaluation of the facts, documented by photos and possible solutions, perhaps with assistance of a fall protection or construction safety expert, should take place whenever some one is injured in a fall at workplace and more responsibly before the recognized hazard has claimed its next victim.

Dr. Ellis is the founder and president of Dynamic Scientific Controls (DSC) and is the author of “Introduction to Fall Protection” published by the American Society of Safety Engineers and currently in the third edition.
Headquartered in Wilmington, DE the DSC division Ellis Litigation Support provides expert witness testimony in fall protection cases across the country. Dr. Ellis has been involved in hundreds of cases and has been instrumental in obtaining multimillion-dollar settlements.

October 2006.

OSHA/BNA – 03/02 – Harness Safety


Occupational Safety & Health Reporter – Harnesses Provide Appearance of Safety,

Volume 32 Number 13
Thursday, March 28, 2002Page 281
ISSN 1522-4082
News

Fall Protection
Harnesses Provide Appearance of Safety,
Safe Anchorage Points Must Be Provided

Employers and workers on construction work sites are “playing the game of fall protection” and leaving workers vulnerable to injury or death, a fall protection expert said March 26.
Workers are told to wear full body harnesses and to tie off when they are working at heights, but employers do not take on the responsibility ensuring that safe anchorage points are available, said J. Nigel Ellis, a consultant with Dynamic Scientific Controls in Wilmington, Del. At the same time, workers often “appear” to be tied off even though they have removed parts of the harness or disconnected the leg straps, either of which can leave result in a fatal fall, Ellis said.
Ellis estimates that 30 percent of the time that employees are working at
heights they are unprotected because the straps around their legs are not
connected, often due to ignorance of the risk.
“Safety is an add-on. It’s not integral,” he said. “The boss passes on the
responsibility and the worker does what is possible as opposed to what is
safe,” he said.
Ellis has analyzed hundreds of fall injuries and fatalities and is the
author of Introduction to Fall Protection, published by the American
Society of Safety Engineers.
Workers and employers are both gambling that they will avoid the one
instance in 1,000 when inadequate protection will result in a serious
injury or death, he said. While employers want to keep workers safe and do remind them to tie off while at heights, often they do not follow through with the systems that would allow them to do that, Ellis said.
“There has to be a revolution [in which] the employer takes responsibility for the anchorage point. [Currently,] what the employer is saying is, ‘You find the anchorage point,’ ” he said.

Workers Play Along
Another contributing factor is that employers tend to hire people who
don’t make waves, he said.
“There is no incentive for workers to observe hazards,” Ellis said. On the
other hand, “there is a great incentive to play along with the managers.”
Even workers who are knowledgeable about how to use their harnesses and
who wear them correctly cannot be expected to know whether an anchorage
point is safe to use, since that requires engineering skills, Ellis said.
Letting the employee guess whether an anchorage point is strong enough or
whether a swing fall from the tie-off point they’ve selected could injure
or kill is not the way to protect workers, Ellis said.
“The point is the employer has to have a plan,” he said.
In California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii, regulations require
employers to do a hazard analysis before construction work begins to address–in advance–how workers will be kept safe, he said.
“We know now that safety has to be integrated into engineering or it will be cast out,” Ellis said.

Total Falls Rising

From 1992 to 2000, the number of fatal falls in all private industry
workplaces has risen steadily from 479 deaths in 1992 to 640 in 2000,
according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. During that period, the
number of deaths from falls only decreased in one year-to-year period.
In 2000, there were 1,154 total fatalities in the construction industry of
which 32.4 percent or about 373 were the result of falls, according to the
BLS.
The best way to prevent fall injuries is by doing more work on the ground, and some employers are doing more structural assembly on the ground and lifting larger pieces with cranes, Ellis said. “More is being done, but not nearly enough,” he said.

Focus on Welders

Fall protection is needed “whenever a chance of body penetration exists due to tools, rebar, or machinery. In most locations, that means
immediately upon leaving the work surface,” Ellis said in a recent article
on welder fall protection safety in the Winter 2002 issue of The World of
Welding. Among construction workers, welders face additional risks because their vision is limited by the welding mask. With the mask in place, a welder has a reduced awareness of surroundings and can have trouble safely
positioning his or her feet, he said. Also, welders face the inherent
danger of working around hot materials at heights, and they must often
work in awkward locations, Ellis said.
In the article, Ellis cited a fatality in which a welder was working with the proper fall protections in place, but the employer had no rescue plan for the situation that resulted. A maintenance worker on a level above the welder was using rags and solvents and spilled the solvent container onto the welder. The welder’s torch ignited the flammable liquid, setting his clothing on fire. The welder then fell to the length of his lanyard.
“Ablaze, he becomes a screaming torch with no rescue plan and no
extinguisher on hand,” Ellis said, in the article.

Fall Protection Mistakes

Ellis cited a number of other fall protection mistakes that have led to welder fatalities. Among them: A worker removed the top portion of a full body harness because it was
too hot, which increased the free fall distance and the result was a
dangerous impact. A worker removed the lower torso portion of the harness and was suspended under the arms, which can be quickly lethal and leaves little time for a rescue. “You asphyxiate. It’s like crucifixion,” Ellis said. A worker taped open the lanyard’s snap hooks which resulted in a fatal disconnection. A worker used untested hardware store parts in a fall protection system and the parts failed under the stress of a real fall.

According to Ellis, the rate of fatal falls rises with age. He attributed the increase to workers having slower reaction times as they age and becoming overconfident. As years pass on the job without an incident, the worker begins to believe nothing will ever happen to them, he said.

Copyright © 2002 by The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc., Washington D.C.

Safety News Item – 01/06/06 – FP Checklist


As he has for a number of years, Dr. J. Nigel Ellis has provided a fall protection checklist for the 2005 and 2006 Greyhouse Safety and Security Directory (chapter 7).

A brief excerpt is included below. Please contact us at 1-800-372-7775 to inquire about getting the complete checklist for your safety resource library.

SUBJECT: Performance
Mark YES or NO
RECOMMENDATION:1.Fall hazards are sought and identified.
2.Fall hazards are recorded and cross-referenced against possible fall protection solutions and preventative maintenance solutions.
ACTION/COMMENT:1. A group of managers and workers should tour. Incorporate a professional fall protection consultant and engineer periodically.
2.Computerized preventative maintenance should show hazard location and solution recommendations.

Safety News Item – 11/04/05 – Ellis Twin Tail Article


The October 2005 issue of Compliance Magazine includes an article by Dr. J. Nigel Ellis entitled “Why the Twin Tail Lanyard requires special attention in design and training”.

In part Dr. Ellis states, “In my opinion, to ensure that workers understand the serious nature of this potential hazard, twin-tail lanyards should include a “danger” warning. Furthermore, this product should be controlled by a qualified person engineer rather than a competent person, because of the application distance considerations and proper matching of component products with special features to allow dissapation of energy.”

To read the entire article, read Compliance or call us for a reprint at 1-800-372-7775 extension 21.

To find out more about this issue go to the article on our web site at Twin Tail Lanyards”.

Dr. Ellis’ article re: Treatment of Harnesses on Fallen Workers by Emergency Response Personnel


Dr. J. Nigel Ellis’ important message about handling the investigation of falls and the handling of any harnesses on the fallen worker by firefighters/EMT or other emergency response personnel has made an impression across the country.
Dr. Ellis recommends that, as much as is possible without endangering the life of the fall victim, the fall protection equipment should be left in place and NOT cut-off until analysis of why it failed can be done.
To read the comprehensive article on the matter – citing Dr. Ellis’ work – click here to go to FireEngineering.com online magazine article “Don’t cut off fall protection equipment when stabilizing the injuries of fall patients”.
Also see the article in this What’s New section pertaining to Dr. Ellis’ comments on safety standards for firefighters.

Please email any comments, suggestions or further information to EFSS@FallSafety.com. We’ll publish your comments!!

Safety News Item – 07/01/05 – Intro to Fall Protection recommmended on OSHA site


Dr. J. Nigel Ellis’ book “Introduction to Fall Protection”, now in the 3rd edition, widely is recognized as a primary resource for all aspects of fall protection information.

In fact, for years OSHA has identified “Introduction to Fall Protection” as a useful resource on its website. Dr. Ellis’ book is listed as an additional reference under fall protection in the Safety and Health topics at Introduction to Fall Protection, 3rd Edition on OSHA website.

How about ordering a copy of for yourself? Order online now.

Dr. Ellis Comments on Safety Standards for Firefighters


As a result of his involvement in a case involving a New York firefighter injured from a fall from a ladder, Dr. Ellis has researched which safety standards apply to firefighters as public employees.

In 1970 OSHA directed that the individual states were responsible for the safety and welfare of its own public employees and had the duty to create and adopt safety plans for public employees.

Few states have adopted such plans and fewer still, if any, have enacted standards and regulations to protect the safety of public workers, including firefighters.

Excerpted below is a letter from Dr. Ellis to New York State officials on what he sees the situation to be in New York and what he feels should be done to protect firefighters.

EXCERPT OF LETTER BY DR. J. NIGEL ELLIS JUNE TO NEW YORK STATE OFFICIALS – JUNE 2005
Public Employees Safety and Health Act of New York in 1994 established PESH and required the State to follow OSHA requirements. PESH has since applied the 1910 standards to public employees in New York. It also has applied the general duty clause when supported by a nationally recognized standard. As I understand it,PESH has not used the 1926 construction regulations. The Act requires that New York State add standards that are necessary for public employees if the OSHA standards are inapplicable.

A first due roof firefighter fell and was severely injured in Staten Island in 1999 when his unsupported ladder pancaked as he was stepping onto the garage roof of a residence at a height of approx. 12 ft in order to pull out windows and create an opening in the roof with his tools. He was using a 16 ft straight ground ladder under dry weather conditions. The ladder had butt spurs that are sharp points at the base of the ladder. The ladder was set up properly at approx. 75 degrees angle according to witnesses. The investigator in his report of the incident confirmed from scratch marks that the ladder had slid outwards from the building because of insecure footing. Due to NYFD reductions in the pumper crews by one person, the buttman generally accepted across the USA was not available to secure the ladder. The footing was on concrete bricks in a driveway.

The OSHA 1910.26 regulation from 1971 required use of the ladder with a secure footing. The OSHA standard referenced the ANSI A14.2-1956 up till the 1990 Federal Register for this wording. If the 1926.1053 regulation could apply for partial roof and window demolition, and the wording would be stronger from the A14.2-1982 standard would apply in support. These ladders are for commercial, residential and industrial use and all are required to have self-leveling feet for supporting a sole climber on hard or soft ground. Also, PESH has not applied the 1926 regulation and this demolition activity was not preplanned. The correct standard to apply for this incident was the ANSI/NFPA 1932-1994 standard (and through current updates) for secure footing supported by mechanical means or a firefighter stationed at the base.

The NFPA 1932 standard is not recognized as a regulation or ordinance in the State of New York so it can be applied to the daily activities of firefighters in the state as a matter of law. Neither has this well-known standard been recognized in support of any general duty violation of private fire brigades in federal law because the situation has yet to arise, I am told. To apply to firefighters in civil actions against the State of New York, there must be an ordinance or regulation in the State. The general duty law by itself has been struck down when applied to public employees. The FDNY training requirements do recognize the need for a buttman but this manual is not an ordinance. The State has failed to recognize the applicable standard in this case in my opinion and make it law under the PESH law.

NFPA 1931/2-1994 ground ladder standards are recognized in ANSI/NFPA 1500-1997 for firefighter occupational safety and health but only for inspection and testing of these ladders and not with regard to use. The popular but non-updated IFSTA 9th edition on Ground Ladders does not adequately support the NFPA 1932 requirement in my opinion in written description and in spite its heavily illustrated manual.

It is my recommendation that the State of New York recognize the ANSI/NFPA 1931/2 in compliance with its own requirements for public employee safety. It is also my recommendation that we recognize that increasingly, ground ladders are being used by firefighters on hard ground in urban areas and that self-adjusting feet be added to the NFPA 1932 standard to provide an option for fire departments to carry ladders with this feature where they know that butt spurs are not suitable and a firefighter buttman will not be available.

Dr. J. Nigel Ellis’ Article on Holes as appeared on www.PlantEngineering.com – June 2003


OPEN AND DISGUISED HOLES GUARANTEE SERIOUS INJURY AND DEATH.

It is widely recognized that workers can fall through floor openings greater than 12” x 12”. OSHA consolidated its floor hole and openings in 1994 to an size opening greater than 2” x 2” reflecting the danger from broken ankles, legs and knee damage. The typical situation is that the worker sees a plywood board on the floor and goes to one side of the board and lifts it up. At the point where it starts to move away from him, he walks into it to get closer without ever seeing underneath and hence walks directly into the opening. The board usually stays up and closes back over part of the hole again. Holes take approximately 35 lives each year in the USA.

Roof openings can exist for utility, smoke vent, skylight or ladder openings.

The typical disguised floor opening is 2’ x 3’ for plastic skylights or 3’ x 3’ for domed skylights or 3’ x 20’ for corrugated roof panels.

Domed skylights are useful for sitting, stepping, standing, backing, stumbling on.

Corrugated skylights age cloudy and yellow, the galvanized corrugated roof decking ages with brown yellow streaks of rust. Eventually they can look the same from the top. Skylight labels have long gone by that time.

An industry floor opening example is the vehicle servicing pit. Horseplay is one cause of a fall. Another is where a customer will take the plunge while returning to the lobby waiting area.

The blame the worker syndrome is part of the “open and obvious” danger defense. In other words, the worker or person should have watched where they were going and probably knew about the opening.
A roof or floor opening is never an open and obvious danger and will always claim it’s victim who is pre-occupied with work or other activity.

Covered holes are those with ¼” Transite which fail under concentrated and unsupported loads. Here is a material which looks similar to concrete. Several persons can step partially on the Transite but it’s collapse gives no warning. Because of the brittle material of concrete and asbestos, there is no give before failure.

Drywall used as a floor hole filler looks like concrete too and can produce fatal results if stepped on. The use of this type material is an unfortunate by-product of a request by an owner or general contractor to a subcontractor to cover a small opening and this never gets into the hands of the structural engineer to check the load limit.

There was confusion over OSHA’s regulation on floor holes in general industry for many years until the A1264.1 clarified in 1989 the term floor/roof openings. The OSHA 1971 general industry regulations have not themselves been changed in this area so this is probably the reason why employers have only completed 5% installation of their skylights with load-supporting grilles after thirty plus years of OSHA.

Construction:
OSHA construction rules published in 1994 are explicit about any hole over two inches minimal dimension. The practical reality is as follows for construction, general industry and any other hole which endangers a person in the future.

All holes must be covered immediately when they are created.
All covers must be secured to prevent casual removal.
All covers must be marked in clear language to users in their native language.

Holes and Roofers:
Roofers typically walk backwards
Tarps for covering in rain

Options, protocols;
Staying 6 ft away from an edge is supposed to be the general rule for edges but not edges of holes.
Manning a hole with a watchman.
Categorize the roof as a no-access area (until a roof leak occurs, or caulking is required).
Leaving the hole closed in until the moment of use (such as walkway gratings, precast concrete HVAC openings).

Hazards of Covers:
Holes that are covered and secured cannot be inspected because nails cannot be seen from six feet distance. Therefore covered holes must have protection underneath them:
1. Net attached to bar-joists
2. A scissor lift (for cutting, installing curbs and working on the hole for installing utility equipment, HVAC and skylights)

Covers as solids, nets or grating:
The most economical temporary covering to a hole less than 4ftx8ft is ¾” construction grade plywood when covering and secured to a 3ftx7ft opening. Nets are useful as pull over devices in oil change pits and some fixed in place warehouse racks. Gratings are used on some construction sites.

Covers as decking on scaffold structures:
Planks of scaffold grade wood are cleated or overlapped, whereas hook-on aluminum scaffold planks.

Markings for covers must be as follows minimally:
DANGER!
HOLE
DO NOT REMOVE COVER!
This is supported by OSHA regulations and ANSI A10.18; the alternative of a colored cover is unreasonable unless language is marked on the cover. Use of the word Caution! or Warning! is also unsatisfactory because they hold no meaning to approaching construction workers or others.

Signs:
When employers choose to leave hazards unattended or create hazard solutions which are themselves hazards, they rarely create warnings appropriate for the situation because they do not typically understand the hazard’s dire danger. When they do choose signs they do not meet the requirements of the Z535 standards and are typically CAUTION signs which rarely gain a worker’s attention.

Covering holes:
With a door, plywood, an instrument sheet metal housing,
In a catwalk, the “obstruction” is pushed aside exposing the hazard raising risk.
Coverings of floor ports by ¾” plywood that are nailed down may be insufficient if fork trucks are in the area because of the torque from the wheel can rip the nail through the plywood exposing the hole. Edges need to be beveled or sanded to provide a smooth surface. Bolts need to be used if that does not work.

Tripping hazards:
A ¾” plywood edge will reasonably be a tripping hazard to any person approaching a secured cover often with the result that the person can experience trauma.

Platforms that become holes, an example:
When underhung scaffolds are secured they are by tube and coupler and a back-up coupler is used for added security. However without the right torque level, the standard (pole) can release producing a sag in the floor resulting in loss of planks or create a chute to slide through railings. Standards should be pinned in every such case to avoid the scaffolding peeling from the structure.

Holes are dangerous because every individual will fall down an unguarded and improperly covered floor/roof opening if the opportunity presents itself when the worker is pre-occupied with his work.

Three modes of a Hole:
A hole in the desert is DORMANT.
A hole in the desert with people in the area is ARMED.
A hole into which a person falls is ACTIVE.
– Dave MacCollum, former President of ASSE

The human brain does not respect holes regardless of training, knowledge and awareness based on my 250 cases in the courts.

J. Nigel Ellis, Ph.D., CSP, P.E., CPE

Nigel Ellis has been an expert in close to 1000 cases to date; 250 of those cases involve holes or disguised holes. His experience in this area intended to cause all employers and safety trainers .

Dr. Nigel Ellis Skylight Safety Article in ByDesign


Dr. Nigel Ellis addresses skylight safety in the US providing valuable information about regulations, testing, weathering issues and fall protections solutions for both new and in-place skylights.

Skylight Safety in the U.S.

Dr. Nigel Ellis Status of Skylight Safety article in The Compass


Dr. Nigel Ellis engages in an in-depth discussion of the hazards of skylights and provides varied suggestions for fall protection solutions.

Status of Skylight Safety

FACE Report recommendations could mislead In The “Safety Tips” section


FACE Report recommendations could mislead In The “Safety Tips”
section

Nigel’s Blog – Elimination of Hazards: Cost Considerations – 10/20/2010


The Elimination or Control of hazards choice obviously has budget considerations.
I used to be 100% FAS when I was a manufacturer of harnesses and devices. However in the past ten years I have become very suspicious of FAS being able to hold up due to habits developing that ease the work or become political tools. Overhead systems are most at risk due to non-reachability for inspection. Maintenance is not usually in a hurry to inspect.
The cost to remedy these troubles takes away from safety departments who discover hazards and train in their solution as a primary focus, in other words FAS keep the hazard around whereas elimination removes it or guards in a very thorough way. Question is does the cost of keeping the hazard around and vigilance make controls the best solution or is merely a short-term focused relief from a continued hazard problem.

I have no doubt you are using the hierarchy of controls. It would be interesting to see what the true cost of any proposed solution might be and then compare that with elimination over lets say a twenty year period.

Nigel’s Blog – Fixed Ladder Anchorage – 08/28/10


Fixed Ladder anchorage bolting into masonry (e.g. on two level roofs) must be inspected frequently (annually) for loss of holding power. Anchorage points on roofs must also be tested regularly by pulling against each other in an approved manner (see Introduction to Fall Protection, third edition).

Nigel’s Blog – Fixed Ladders – 08/28/10


A14.3- 2008 Fixed Ladders require testing for horizontal or outward thrust when falling with a harness. This is provided by the 8-point test of the HSE in Britain which should be followed pending a change in the A14.3 standard.
Two products have been withdrawn from the ladder climbing protection market (both notched tube systems).
I suggest you only order products that have successfully passed the HSE test. Check out DBI and Tuf-Tug.

Nigel’s Blog – Snaphook Gates – 08/29/10


Lanyard Pelican Snaphook gates at 220/350lb are far too weak to survive being damaged in Americas plants and construction sites: Change now to ANSI Z359.1 compliant 3600 lb gate strength regardless of the out of date A10.32-2004 which maintains the 220lb gate.

Nigel’s Blog – Y Lanyards – 08/28/10


Y-Lanyards must have a 5000 lb strength between all hooks per Z359.1-2007. Also a breakaway harness attachment for the users legs is important for the unused leg. Without this, a star-shaped fall arrest may occur which can be very injurious .

Professional Safety Magazine: Three-Point Control Analysis & Recommendations for Climbing Ladders, Stairs & Step Bolts


Professional Safety Magazine: Three-Point Control
Analysis & Recommendations for Climbing Ladders, Stairs & Step Bolts

Three Point Control Ellis In Depth Analysis – October 2011


Click the link below to read Dr. Nigel Ellis’ detailed and in-depth article: ” Three Point Control: Analysis and Recommendations”.
This article is relevant to almost any fall hazard situation. Learning more about three point control is critical to the design of work processes that allow for greater stability and reliability when moving and working above ground where a fall can occur.

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