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These are the most important types of safety workwear necessary for every construction worker. Read on!
Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) plays an important role in ensuring the safety of its users. PPEs are mainly preventive since they prevent and reduce the extent of injuries in accidents.
Different industries use PPEs, especially when accidents are bound to happen due to company operations. One such industry that extensively uses PPEs is construction.
There are many PPEs, each of which serves a different purpose. Which of these PPEs is ideal for construction workers for their workwear?
Here are the construction must-haves:
What's Inside
Visibility Clothing
There are often dark spots in a construction site, especially during the initial stages. These dark areas are prone to accidents since workers can’t see each other. Hence, the importance of visibility clothing for construction workers.
Visibility clothing is made of neon colors like orange and green, making them quite visible during the day or at night. Therefore, ensure construction workers wear visibility clothing at all times. Workers will be able to spot each other easily, preventing injuries.
If some fail to wear them because of the lack of funds, be sure to provide them as a company. You can get many best deals for workwear & PPE, especially if you buy in bulk. Thus, you shouldn’t worry about too many expenses.
Safety Boots
Safety boots are footwear that protects feet from injuries. These boots have steel toe caps to protect your toes. Should a heavy object fall on your toes, the steel cap will cushion the impact, protecting your toes. They also have a steel plate on the shoe bottom, in addition to the shoe’s hardness, which prevents objects, like nails, from penetrating your shoe.
The other feature is that boots have an anti-slip feature. It prevents construction workers from slipping as they work.
Helmet
A helmet is a hard hat that protects against head injuries. Head injuries on a construction site are rampant, especially when the construction is at a height.
Debris and other objects could fall on the workers at the ground level. The helmet will prevent direct impact on the head, protecting the workers.
Besides falling objects, you’ll find protruding items like scaffolding and steel pieces. You can hit your head against these items, injuring you. Nonetheless, with a helmet on, you won’t get injured.
As you wear helmets, ensure you secure them to your head with the straps. And they should have the inner part that breaks the contract between your head and the helmet. It prevents your head from absorbing all the shock from objects that fall on your head.
Ear Protection
Construction sites are often full of heavy machinery moving around as they make work easier for workers. These pieces of machinery often produce a lot of noise as they run, which can be a nuisance. Yet it’s important to note that small machinery also produces a lot of noise, like grinders and drills.
All this noise can interfere with your hearing, as the tool user and those near you. This noisy environment makes it necessary for construction workers to wear ear protection, specifically ear muffs. You don’t want workers to get hearing issues and other noise-related problems.
Safety Gloves
Construction works differ from each other. Some of them require the use of hand-operated tools like drills and saws. Here, hand injuries are prone to happen. Hence, safety gloves are a must-have for construction workers.
There are different safety gloves, whose choice depends on the task. For instance, fire is possible from the sparks if you’re welding. Therefore, your industrial gloves should be fire retardant.
If you’re into cutting with a saw, your gloves should be hard and thick enough to prevent the penetration of the saw. However, it’s important to note that it won’t stop the cutting. It’ll prevent the saw from reaching your hand faster, reducing the chances of injuries.
Eye Protection
As stated earlier, there are many construction activities. Some increase the risk of eye injury. For instance, if you’re cutting wood, the chips tend to fly around and can get into your eye. Hence, the need for eye protection gear, like safety goggles.
Some activities like welding require special eye protection to prevent eye damage from the activity. Here, you’ll need goggles with filtered lenses; they’ll protect you from infrared light. But ensure they aren’t filtered too much that they prevent you from seeing as you weld.
Fall Protection Gear
Construction activities are often risky, especially if they’re to be done at height. Workers could be painting the exterior walls of your building project, installing external windows on top floors, or even cleaning. In addition to harnesses and scaffolding, using rubber wheel stops can be essential for securing vehicles and equipment on sloped surfaces, enhancing safety on site.
Imagine a situation where one of these workers slips and falls from the sixth floor. The likelihood of this is death or life-altering body injuries.
Fall protection gear is a must-have to prevent such occurrences. Some of these gears are harnesses, belts, scaffolding, and buckles.
Each of these will help construction workers reach high heights without endangering their lives. Should any of them fall, harnesses will hold them and prevent them from hitting the ground, protecting them.
With fall protection gear, ensure you avail enough for your construction workers.
The Takeaway
Lives are precious hence the need to protect them, which is where personal protective equipment comes in. The discussion above has shown how PPEs help protect the lives of construction workers. It has further discussed the specific PPEs you must have in a construction site to enhance safety.
If you serve in the construction industry, be sure to acquire these safety gear. On the other hand, as construction project managers, please avail safety gear on site for your construction workers. You’ll help protect lives and save livelihoods.
