Health & safety bulletin
Preparation And Job Planning
18th February 2010
As part of sharing lessons learnt, Andy and Todd Wyer, who are diligent Xmo workers with good safety awareness, have agreed to me sharing information on a potential incident and the lessons learnt by them while auditing a site recently.
Shortly before the job was due to start, their company van broke down and they loaded the equipment that they thought they would need into a hire van, but omitted to include the trestles that they use to make a work platform.
Wanting to get the job done for our customer on time, and to avoid any additional costs, they decided to use two barriers on which they rested a plywood board to make a suitable work surface. Whilst the platform was convenient, at the right height and relatively stable, it was not designed to be load bearing and was an example of equipment being used for a purpose for which it isn't designed. The incident was addressed at the time and new trestles were purchased locally, as shown in the ‘before’ and ‘after’ photographs below.
We should always ask “what's the worst thing that could happen?” In this case there was the potential for someone who was unaware to rest a heavy load on the makeshift bench and cause it to collapse and hurt someone.
Please remember that planning how you do a job is as important as continually undertaking last minute risk assessments throughout the duration of your day.
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| BEFORE | AFTER |
I am pleased to say that no incident occurred, no-one was hurt, customer was very supportive and Andy and Todd are happy to share the lesson learnt with others.