There is nothing more important than ensuring everyone’s safety when working in a construction zone. Everything involved in doing that should be the top priority before any other consideration. There’s a lot of things that can go wrong when you are working in a construction zone from things falling to equipment malfunctioning to so many other things. Here are few tips for keeping workers and the surrounding community completely safe.

Safety Attire
All workers should be required to wear thick clothing, steel toe boots, hard hats, gloves and safety goggles at all times. If you are working in a warm climate, this might be uncomfortable but it’s better to be safe than comfy. Of course, you don’t want to overheat your workers so investing in safety clothing that has good airflow is a good idea in these cases. There should never be a time while on site that a worker removed his hat, shoes or goggle. This are the main areas that can be damaged at a moment’s notice so make sure that your workers are adhering to the rules. If you suspect that once you leave the site, so does the safety attire, appoint a manager to oversee them and give them the authority to implement sever consequences for anyone who is not willing to wear their safety gear at all times.

OSHA Fall Protection Training
Every employee should go through an OSHA fall protection training course periodically. It’s easy to forget the mandatory requirements for checking equipment that has the ability to drop materials or cause things to fall. OSHA fall protection training covers all of that including how to make sure that all equipment and machines are in good working condition and web slings, lifting chains, crane pads and other assisting measures are functioning properly. It might be a good idea to compel all works to sit through this class at least twice a year. Every six months is a good rule of thumb for a fall protection course.

No Civilians
There should never be any civilians allowed on site at anytime. It doesn’t matter whether the site is in progress or done for the day. Civilians are not to be allowed on site. If a worker wants to show the family where they work, they can stand outside the limits. There are too many things that can go wrong. Civilians have definitely not gone through the OSHA fall protection training and do not know how to behave in a construction zone and they likely don’t have the correct clothing. There are trenches and holes that they may not see, they probably aren’t wearing the correct shoes to maintain good grip of the loose soil and dirt and may not recognize wet concrete. Not only are all of these things dangerous but they hold the potential to mess up some of the work that is in progress.

Check Equipment Daily
This might seem like overkill. What could change between one day to the next? Especially if you didn’t use it the day before. Well, you’d be surprised. It might be an inconvenience but it’s better to be safe. Especially if the construction site is near civilian communities or areas like neighborhoods, freeways, parks, etc, it’s important to know 100% that nothing is going to malfunction or break down in the middle of the job. This could cause loads to fall, get stuck and eventually severely hurt someone. Every day there should be a procedure and a checklist that is gone through to check every machine and every piece of equipment. Load bearing mechanisms should be tested and approved for work every single day.

Appoint a Manager
If you, as the owner, are not able to be on site at all times, you need to appoint someone who you can trust in order to make sure that all standards are being adhered to and rules followed. It’s not that people want to rebel or even disagree with the system, it’s just that people tend to forget. They need incentives to try and remember. Implementing consequences when safety clothing is not worn or a machine goes unchecked is a good opportunity to show the workers that you are very serious about safety.