Assessment of Fire Accidents in Construction Industries - Coursework Example

Topic: Assessment of Fire Accidents in Construction Industries Name of Student: Name of Institution: Name of Tutor: Date of Submission: TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Introduction 2 2. Current fire, health, safety and environmental legislation and its application in construction and engineering industries 3 3. Risk assessment and evaluation of risks for industrial activities in specific work place hazards 4 3.1. Major risks that are encountered in an industrial setup 4 3.2. Assessment of risks caused by industrial accidents 5 3.3. Investigation process for Industrial accidents 5 4. Analysis of working situations and development of working strategies to ensure effective management of health and safety legislation 7 4.1. The case Study of Bread factory horror 7 4.2. Options for pursuing civil actions 8 5. Conclusion 9 6. References 9 1. Introduction There are certain guidelines that need to be followed in design of working conditions for employees to ensure safety at work and heath of employees is maintained. These guides are contained in Safety, Health and Welfare of Workers Act of 2005. This Act provides certain regulations that have to be followed during creation of working conditions for employees. There are a number of benefits that are aimed at when these policies are observed. These include reduced cases of accidents and reduced costs of operation. This paper provides some of the sections of the Act and its application to industrial construction sector. It also provides a case study of an area where legislation needs to provide these policies. 2. Current fire, health, safety and environmental legislation and its application in construction and engineering industries According to Safety, health and Welfare at Work Act of the year 2005, employers have to be practicable, create safety, wealth and health at work and ensure the welfare of its employees are safeguarded. The person in charge of any work place should ensure safety of the workplace, accessibility and safe egress. Section 8 of the Act requires that employers must obtain the services of a skilled person. According to section 2(2) of this act, a competent person is one who possesses the right level of training, experience and knowledge with respect to the tasks and size of hazards of the task or extent of the hazard of the undertaking. Assessment of suitability in terms of the specific intended functions has to be done. The person in charge of employees has to ensure that he has the right knowledge of the current practices in the sector and be prepared to counteract challenges in the training process. However, the process of appointing a competent person does not exclude the employer from his responsibilities under the legislation. According to section 11 of the 2005 Act, employers are required to devise the right emergency plans and processes and create the right measures that are significant in fire fighting and evacuation of employees at the work place. The processes of addressing any safety areas of health and welfare of employees should be based on consideration of all employees as well as any person connected with the work place especially in a case where there is the need to address emergency access and egress. In addition, section 12 of the 2005 act requires that there is the need for consideration of safety of persons a part from employees within the work place. Everything that can be predicted has to be done to be assured that everybody at the work place is not subjected to risks to the safety of their health. Furthermore, section 15 of the Act requires that landlords are obliged with the work place to ensure safety of access to egress from workplace. Based on section 19 of the act, it is the responsibility of employers to carry out risk assessment and ensure these are recorded in the safety Statement. This should be followed by a fire risk assessment which involves fire prevention, fire detection as well as emergency escape and fire fighting. According to sections 8, 9 and 10 of the act, there is the need to provide sufficient information, training and supervision to ensure safety of employees and there is the need to provide such instructions and training that accounts for any employees that have specific needs to be assured of their protection against any dangers that are likely to befall them 3. Risk assessment and evaluation of risks for industrial activities in specific work place hazards 3.1. Major risks that are encountered in an industrial setup The major risks that are encountered in an industrial setup are accident. An accident is an unplanned incident that usually has a specific cause that are technical in nature. The other cause of accidents is human causes such as unsafe working conditions such as material handling facilities. Environmental causes include too low temperatures that result into shivering or too high temperatures that result into headache and improper illumination that result into overstrain glares and shadows. Other environmental conditions that result into accidents include noise, bad odor or light emerging from the adjacent machinery, equipment and processes. Poor housekeeping practices and working for longer hours are some environmental conditions that result into accidents at work place. Human factors also contribute to accidents in a number of ways: these include carelessness, daydreaming or ignorance. Personal factors that contribute to accidents include lack of knowledge and skills, wrong attitude towards work, fatigue, mental worries, and age and health complications. 3.2. Assessment of risks caused by industrial accidents Assessment of risks associated with accidents such as economic costs of the accident are significant in determining the economic consequences that may result from the accident. For instance, an accident can result into costs being incurred by an company in compensation such as payments and overhead costs. It also includes estimation of costs that an organization will incur in treatment of the affected individuals during the accident. The assessment process must also involve determining the equipment that may be destroyed during the accident and the wages and profitability reduction as a result of the accident. During the assessment process, other effect of the accident that may be investigated includes delays in production or costs incurred in setting up the facilities in preparation for a new operation process. In assessing an industrial accident, the employer may also need to replace the existing employees in terms of recruitment into the company. This may involve payment of wages to the new employee. During assessment, these costs have to be accounted for. 3.3. Investigation process for Industrial accidents Investigation of an industrial accident is a significant step in ensuring safety in an industry. The role of investigation process is to determine the various causes of an accident with the purpose of taking the right action in preventing similar situations in the future. It does not involve punishment motives. Otherwise, it may result into more harm than good. The process of investigation has to be done as early as possible and involve collection of information relating to safety acts, working conditions and personal activities of employees that are difficult to get later. The officer responsible for investigation is the shop supervisor. He is the only worker who has the right information regarding the accident and has the full information relating to the machines, facilities and working environment. The main data relating to the accident by the investigator involves injuries to parts of the body such as fractures and burns or cuts. In addition, the source of the injury should be determined such as electrical or mechanical components. This is followed by determination of how the accident took place such as the role of poor housekeeping and the role played by unsafe working conditions such as unsafe loading drifting. This should be followed by taking appropriate measures to ensure that the accident is reduced in the future. Costs resulting from the accident should be determined such as direct costs and indirect costs. When reporting the accident, main benefit that an industry encounters is that future occurrence is avoided or minimized. All accidents that occur need not to be reported except only those that have been recorded. This requires effective recording of accidents by the departments concerned to assist in planning corrective steps for preventing the accident. The records are important for safety points of views. Some of the records that need to be kept separately by the department include first aid reports, accident investigation report that includes information relating to the company and the people affected by the accident and their relationship with the company. 4. Analysis of working situations and development of working strategies to ensure effective management of health and safety legislation 4.1. The case Study of Bread factory horror In the case where two bakery workers died after they were sent by their bosses to conduct repairs in an oven that had not been cooled properly to enable workers get into it, investigation of the situations indicate that there are a number of aspects of criminal laws that were breached. For instance, section 8 of the Safety, health and Welfare at Work Act of the year 2005 was breached. This section requires that employers must obtain the services of a skilled person who possesses the right level of training, experience and knowledge with respect to the tasks and size of hazards of the task or extent of the hazard of the undertaking. The employer in this factory did not care to observe this regulation and opted to seek the services of unskilled employees who did not have the right level of skills and experience to know the dangers associated with the work they were assigned to do. As a result, they could not know that it was dangerous to get into the oven before certain duration of time of cooling. In addition section 11 of the 2005 Safety, health and Welfare at work Act was breached. This section requires that employers have to ensure that the right evacuation and emergency systems are created for fighting fire outbreak in a working environment. The factory did not have any emergency systems for signaling the outsiders for help during the accident. Consequently, workers who went into the oven to carry out repairs could not convey their emergency signals to the people within the factory to come to their assistance. Consequently, it was difficult to evacuate them from the oven and they were not helped. The incident also indicates that section 12 of the 2005 Safety, health and welfare of employees was breached. This section requires that employers have to develop the right safety measures for all people within an organization and requires that everything that can be predicted is done to ensure that employees are not subjected to risks to their safety and health. The bakery did not obey this act because employees who went into the bakery were not provided with the right safety and protective equipment which ensured they were safe. They were provided with thin suits, hats gloves and elbow knee pads but these were done in the last minutes. Since this equipment was not effective enough to provide them with protection from the temperature of the oven, they could not withstand the heat and this resulted into their deaths. 4.2. Options for pursuing civil actions There are certain ways in which the relatives of the affected individuals can seek civil actions against the factory. The first course of action in seeking action against the company is to require the company to provide them with information regarding working conditions of the oven at the time of the accident such as the temperature of the oven and protective equipment that were given to the workers. If the factory cannot provide this information, the families of the affected workers can seek the intervention of the courts. The relatives of the affected individuals also need to ask the factory to provide them with any signed work permit between the workers and the factory. Failure to provide this information should be equal to neglect of the company towards safety of their employees. As a result, they should ask the courts to penalize the company for the incident. The relatives of affected individuals also need to determine whether the affected workers were provided with any first aid. This should be proved by provision of First Aid report. If the company does not provide this information, the courts should seek the action of the courts for legal action against the factory and compensation for damage inflicted on them. Relatives of affected workers should also ask the factory officials to explain to court the conditions that led to the accident. They should ask the employers to explain whether they were aware that the oven was too hot for the workers to get into it. They should also explain whether they ensured it was safe before sending employees into it. This should be proved by provision of a work permit that needs to be signed before the accident. Failure to do this should result into accusation of the factory for neglect. 5. Conclusion This paper shows that Safety, health and Welfare at Work Act of the year 2005 is important in creation of measures which ensure the welfare of employees in an organization is protected. This is achievable when employers put up safety measures that are required by this Act within their organizations. It also shows that there are various assessment tasks that need to be done during an accident in an organization. The assessment involves determination of various consequences that are likely to emerge in case of an accident. Organizations are then able to create methods of avoiding the possibilities of making mistakes in the care for their employees and reduce the chances of accidents. This paper also provides legal procedures that need to be followed against the employing company in case a person is affected by industrial accidents 6. References Venables, Roger. Environmental Handbook for Building and Civil Engineering Projects: Checklists, Obligations, Good Practice and Sources of Information. London: CIRIA, 1994. Print. Joyston-Bechal, Simon, and Helen Grice. Health and Safety Law for the Construction Industry: Masons Guide. London: Thomas Telford, 2004. Print. Read More