HazardZone – Access Control
Hazard Zone: an area with high potential of danger
Access Control: selective restriction of access to a place based on role and purpose.
Construction incidents don’t just happen on their own, construction incidents occur because of poor planning and communication leaving high potential for hazardous acts and behaviour. It’s costly. It costs in regulation, fines, overruns and can result in loss of life. If planned correctly, hazards can be identified and corrected before they occur. It’s usually the result of a series of unplanned events that ultimately lead to an incident.
Construction sites are still dangerous places, but things can’t stay the same.
The Big Picture
In the UK alone there are:
- 40 Deaths
- 56,000 injuries.
- 1 million working days lost
- With a tangible cost of £1.6bn per year
All Health and Safety professionals will be aware of The RICS (Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors) Construction Safety Code of Practice (CCP), and that it is not intended to act as an alternative to the regulations governing building work. Its purpose is to provide guidance on the risks associated with specific construction work and how risks should be assessed. The CCP emphasises that negligence in this context does not equate to recklessness or stupidity, but rather ‘the result of a lack of due diligence’. So, how do we go from risk assessment to actions that will promote change, reduce the risk of injury and reduce that impact of the lack of due diligence.
We realise you want to keep your people and projects safe, on time and in budget.
What if there were a way to control access to dangerous places, to prevent accidents on construction sites?
HazardZone Access Control
We have created Protect, a HazardZone Access Control system which consists of a series of smart sensors that are designed to protect people, plant and places. These give an early warning system to restrict access based on role and purpose to areas of a high potential of danger.
How does it work?
The Protect system is a combination of smart sensors, and in combination with our HazardZone technology within our Affect Platform, allows contractors to stop the wrong people, entering the wrong places at the wrong time.
- The TeamTag protects people,
- the HazardTag connects hazardous places,
- and the MachineTag protects people and places from the impact of machinery
So, what might that look like in the construction environment?
- A HazardZone around a human, to prevent the spread of contagious diseases. (Otherwise known as social distancing)
Safety:
There were 40 fatal injuries to workers in 2019/2020, with 47% resulting from falls from height.
- A HazardZone defined on an elevated platform preventing operatives without adequate training and/or equipment from accessing it, preventing falls from height
- A HazardZone around scaffolding preventing operatives from walking underneath the structure, preventing falling objects or entrapment
- A HazardZone defined along electrical services, preventing contact with electricity.
- A HazardZone so that vehicles and pedestrians are separated, preventing access to pedestrian walkways and other safety lanes
- A HazardZone around a machine, restricting access to essential personnel only, preventing operatives being struck by a moving vehicle
Quality:
- A HazardZone defined around a buried service, preventing operatives and machinery from entering without permission
- HazardZone preparation and planning prior to project commencement to prevent Scope Creep and Last-Minute Changes
- A HazardZone defined around an area of protected conservation or ecology, preventing environmental impact
- A HazardZone Access Control to monitor Subcontractor’s access, preventing fluctuations and contract extensions
- A HazardZone to identify where mobile plant is, and where it may interact with other mobile plant
Our aim is to build safer and more connected environments, for construction companies to deliver projects on time, in budget and with zero harm.
Some construction incidents are unavoidable; however they can be managed better. With research, documentation and analysis of industry practices, information sharing and collaboration across industry sectors can improve safety on construction sites. This all needs data. Using the right tech recipe is key in building an optimised construction site. While there are numerous technologies and techniques to select from, using the right combination to develop scaled, centralised solutions will determine the right “tech cocktail” to harvest this data to inform and improve safety on construction sites.
Massive disasters like building collapses and crane collapses create a chain reaction of multiple hazards which affect all across the construction industry. As these events happen so fast there is little time to react or prepare beforehand, but by using a range of technologies, the risk or these events can be mitigated against, and the impact decreased significantly.
We believe it is time for the construction industry to radically change how hazardous activity is managed. To reduce project delays, reduce the risk of harm, and increase the speed of site communications.
Will we ever achieve Zero Harm? Most likely not. But putting a system in place that digitalises hazards and learns when dangerous acts could happen would increase the speed for the industry to reach the Zero Harm goal.
