11.03.2010

Almost right but…

A pair of signage contractors in Northern Ireland were spotted arriving on site with the right access equipment a 60ft self propelled articulated boom lift but….clearly had no notion of how to use it properly and easily qualify as one of our Death Wish series. All too often we see that someone has made an effort but are clueless on how to use it safely. .
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The right equipment but no notion of how to use it

Here are the details in the words of our reader:

“I have seen something today that we seem to see over and over again, yet another case of having the right equipment and then not using it to its full potential.

While in a retail park in Coleraine, Northern Ireland I saw these two guys about to set to work in a MEWP so thought I’d hang about for few minutes. After unloading their van the two fellas jumped into the basket and proceeded up to change the fluorescent tubes behind the advertising signs.
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They obviously don't realise that the lift is telescopic?

They never even tried to get the basket close to the signs, and I know the machine they had would have easily reached, then one of the guys jumped out of the basket and began to walk around on the roof sections while he went about his work. At one stage they had a step ladder on the roof, both of them were out of the basket and even happily chatted away on their phones while pacing up and down the roof. They were up on all levels of the roof, and although not a great height, it was still a long way to the road below if one of them slipped or fell.

There were a few other issues, harnesses, traffic management (one solitary traffic cone) and protection of the public walking in and out of the open shop below, but my main point being that they (or a supervisor) had obviously put some thought into arranging the proper access equipment but then let themselves down by not taking care of the finer details and not using the MEWP to its full potential.”

The company van had them down as the ‘signage division’ of a well known Northern Ireland company, so would guess that these guys carried out this sort of work on a regular basis. I had to head back to work so I hope they made it home to their wives and kids okay..