Did you know that dropped objects from heights is now the third biggest killer in the workplace and has caused thousands of fatal injuries in recent years? Let’s take our health and safety to new heights!
Even less serious accidents can have significant implications. In 2017, falling objects accounted for over 7,000 non-fatal injuries in the UK, and 75% of these incidents resulted in over 7 days of lost work time each. Even with these “recoverable injuries” there is a great deal of trauma for the people and families involved – especially if it can lead to loss of income. But all this can be avoided . . .
Often people can underestimate the effect of an object when it is dropped from a height. Even a 2kg hammer dropped from a height of 5m will have the impact force of one tonne. But most accidents occur simply because most workers don’t appreciate the dangers of dropped objects.
Quadrant2Design want to help change this. We strongly believe no-one should be exposed to the risk of falling objects at work. This is why we have put our full support behind the Health and Safety Executive’s STOP THE DROP campaign – an initiative launched to raise awareness of working at heights in the exhibition and events industry.
Working at heights is, not surprisingly, a common activity in our field of work, as our installers are either building or dismantling an exhibition stand at the top of a ladder. If not done properly, or safely, this can be a very dangerous situation for both the installer and others working close by – in fact, it is often the people passing by who are at the greatest risk.
Insufficient training and inadequate risk assessments are the two main reasons for dropped object incidents in the workplace or at exhibitions. And studies have shown that these accidents, more often than not, happen inside companies that don’t have the correct preventive procedures in place.
Here at Quadrant2Design, we have a strong health and safety culture. As we have some of the most rigorous exhibition stand quality control checks in the industry, we are certainly not going to let standards slip when it comes to the protection of our employees in their working environment – let alone put anyone else at risk.
We take our health and safety seriously. Our Production and Installations Manager, Harry Clegg, has implemented a series of procedures to ensure all our installers undergo rigorous ladder safety and manual handling training before they even start working at heights. In addition to this, all of our installers will have to complete risk assessments and checklists for every part of the exhibition stand to build and dismantle process.
These processes might add more time to our exhibition build process but they help us to create a safe working zone for our staff and minimise any risk of injury from dropped objects.But most importantly of all, we only work with Prestige Event System – the world’s premier exhibition stand system.
And unlike the generic modular stand systems used by other exhibition companies – which are either too heavy/bulky or too light-weight and shoddy – Prestige is the only solution which is light while being strong and high quality.
As this means our exhibition stand components are incredibly light-weight and the assembly process is almost tool free, we can proudly boast that construction of stands is at a far lower health and safety risk than many of our competitors.
Even our taller Prestige stands are incredibly light weight and more stable than other stand systems, meaning they pose less of a health and safety risk than many of the stand structures you will see in exhibition halls.
When choosing an exhibition company, you might not first think to check their health and safety processes, but as you can see in this industry it is essential to be aware of the dangers of working at height.
As the STOP THE DROP campaign makes clear, working at a height in an unsafe way cannot just be fatal to the worker but for others in the vicinity.
But every accident can be avoided if the correct training and risk assessment processes are in place . . .
At Quadrant2Design we use safe systems and have implemented strict procedures to minimise the risk of accidents from objects being dropped from a height, all in accordance with HSE regulations and the STOP THE DROP initiative.
Don’t take a chance on unsafe practices in the exhibition industry. Support STOP THE DROP and help us to prevent any accidents from objects dropped from a height.
Visit STOP THE DROP for more information.