Maximum Arresting Force (or M.A.F.) is a term you will hear frequently used in association with fall protection, so it’s better to understand the term before you encounter it (if you’ve already encountered it, better late than never!).  In simple terms, M.A.F. is exactly what it sounds like:...

According to the ADA Code of Federal Regulations, anytime your facility falls under one of two categories, ADA compliance is necessary. These categories are as follows:

As with most professions, Safety professionals often come into the field in positions where their responsibility is to focus on the day-to-day tasks of a jobsite or facility.  The “big picture” is left to somebody else, whether it’s the Corporate Safety Director or some other member of a...

Swing falls are not as fun as they might sound at first. In fact, in all seriousness, swing falls can be extremely dangerous. Unfortunately, many people, when working at heights, fail to take swing into consideration. So, just what is swing?

Swing is what occurs when...

This is the last and final article in a series that covers that basics of personal fall protection. First we took a look at anchor points, secondly we reviewed body harnesses, and now in this last article we look at the devices that connect the anchor and the harness.

We have all heard the story. OSHA comes into a factory or onto a construction site and things are such a mess they immediately shutdown all operations.  Work stops.  That steel beam being lifted into place by that crane?  Leave it hanging.  Those trucks full of concrete?  Let them go to...

There are some things you can hand to somebody with no instructions and they’ll know how to use them: a pair of boots, a pair of gloves, safety glasses.  A fall protection harness is not one of these things.  To the untrained eye, a harness is just a jumble of straps and buckles with no...

We often focus here on what you need to do to keep your employees safe and to ensure your company is compliant with the law, but at some point in time, some of you are going to be involved in an OSHA inspection and the outcome may not be as favorable as you’d like.  In this post, we’re...

Safety in the workplace is often an afterthought or thought of as a hindrance to getting real work done. Having a couple of dusty signs warning your workers of loud noises isn't necessarily a strong safety culture. Let's break down hot to get there.

Fear of falling is natural.  Once believed to occur only as a result of a traumatic experience, it has more recently become considered a condition you are born with.  Most people fear falling because – well – gravity.  We can’t fly.  We don’t bounce.  We fall, we land – sometimes...

Because stepladders are such a common tool, even in the home, it is often taken for granted that employees know how to properly use them.  This is a dangerous assumption.  Most people don’t thoroughly inspect their ladders at home and many wouldn’t know what to look for if they did.  Many...

Anytime you are tasked to keep someone safe from falling, one decision must be made first. Do I select a Passive System or Active System?

Understanding the difference between passive and active fall protection is a great place to start.

Earning the Certified Safety Professional (CSP) Certification from the Board of Certified Safety Professionals (BCSP) is an incredible feeling. You have likely studied for hours and put in hard work to prepare for the exam. When you receive the piece of paper that says, “Congratulations! You...

Safety training isn’t just a good idea; OSHA regulations require that your personnel be trained. Often, it is argued that training is unnecessary because the employee in question had many years of experience with the given work. Years of experience will mean that they most likely know how to...

In the first two articles on the Hierarchy of Controls, we discussed controls that were intended to mitigate hazards at their source either through elimination, substitution, or an engineering solution that made it so the employee was no longer exposed.  With administrative controls, we...

In the last article, we discussed the first level of control when it comes to protecting employees from recognized hazards: elimination or substitution.  The concept, while possibly difficult to implement, was simple to understand.  Unfortunately, this second step, engineering...

Things go wrong.  Equipment fails.  Accidents happen.  When discussing the inevitability of injuries in the workplace, these are reasons you will hear to argue against the belief that all incidents are preventable.  While a manufacturing defect could occur without forewarning, the vast...

Years ago, there was little choice of which type of fall protection you could use because there just wasn’t much variety available. More recently, though, manufacturers have made great strides in occupational safety technology. In fact, for almost every situation there is a...