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Safety Technologies


Tragedy & Expense: The High Cost of Low Electrical Safety

The electrical industry is one of the most dangerous work environments for employees. The risk of injuries and fatalities is high due to the nature of the work and the amount of interaction workers have with dangerous equipment and conditions. Electrical incidents happen daily, putting lives and...

Fighting Heat Stress With Effective Workwear

In a perfect world, we could all work in weather-controlled environments where heat wouldn’t be a factor and comfort could be maximized. Many workplaces however, deal with very high temperatures and heat stress is a year-round risk that requires serious consideration. For many years the standards...

Safety Best Practices


Keeping the Lineman and His Work Site Safe

Line-construction contractors can do their best to train the management, offer safety training and equipment and trust the foremen who are appointed to a job, but it is an inherently dangerous business. Despite all the safeguards, some new linemen say this is what some foremen tell them about...

Obsoleting The Absence Of Voltage Test?

For more than a decade, thousands of users have deployed Permanent Electrical Safety Devices (PESDs) to reduce the risks in isolating electrical energy. This elegantly simple innovation increases the probability that workers are only exposed to ‘zero voltage’ when doing an absence of voltage...

Utility Safety Standards


Fall Protection: The ABCs of Connecting Devices

A personal fall protection arrest system (PFAS) is comprised of three vital components: an anchorage, body wear (full-body harnesses), and a connecting device (a shock-absorbing lanyard or self-retracting lifeline). The safety of at-height workers depends on these three components, and each one...

How to Prevent Struck-By and Backover Incidents

Struck-by, struck-against and back-over incidents are far too common: 421 Hudson St., Manhattan, NYC: Construction worker killed by scaffolding plank. Woods Hole Golf Club, Falmouth, MA: Construction worker injured in back-over accident. Interstate 440-East, Raleigh, NC: DOT workers seriously...

Lineman Safety

Fall Protection Becomes Mandatory

New regulation removes “optional” to increase worker safety

BY CRAIG FIRL, Capital Safety

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) published updated rules and regulations in April 2014 that impact fall protection for the electrical utility industry. These new regulations, which replace rules dating back to the 1970s, have been in development since 2005 and will replace guidelines that were both out-of-date and inconsistent. OSHA estimates the new rules will prevent an additional 118...

Lineman Safety Articles