The need for loading, unloading, and maintenance of vehicles, where no alternative safer methods exist, may give rise to falls from 1.30m up to 4.00m or more.
A fall from a typical height vehicle bed( eg 1.80m) can result in a serious injury. According to the HSE, 75% of falls occur during loading and unloading.
Falls from vehicles are now a more important safety issue as high number of incidents were recognised by the HSE and became a focus of interest and a major campaign topic. The HSE website contains valuable advice on this subject.
The potential for falls from vehicles has now begun to be addressed in a large variety of ways
- Avoidance of mounting vehicles by load planning and improved vehicle selection e.g. mechanical handling
- On site drive in gantries
- Bolted guardrail systems
- Chain link and similar flexible systems
- Adaption of proprietary edge protection systems
- Special components for perimeter edge platforms
- Large vehicles soft landing bags
- Counterweight ‘hangman’ systems ( tested to BSEN795:2012 class B)
- Fall arrest / PFPE fixing solutions
A number of these ways of collective methods to prevent falls, come under the auspices of BSEN13374: 2013