Mitchellson - HAVS risk reduction
Mitchellson’s Health & Safety culture and management approach is based on working to a higher level than the industry recommended best practice, exceeding the legal compliance issues and way above the minimum required by current legislation. It also incorporates collaborative teamwork and innovation, which is driven by the belief that we all have a right to a safe and healthy work environment.
Their goal is to consistently provide staff and workforce with the training, instruction, information and equipment that they need to carry out their works safely, and in a manner that promotes the maintenance of everyone else’s Health and Safety.
This is why the Reactec Analytics Platform was chosen to support the Mitchellson Health & Safety culture and management approach.
Bradley Allen, HSQE Manager at Mitchellson said “Historically we have tracked tool usage as part of a measure of controls to understand exposure risk by requiring the tool store man to note down operator estimates of tool use. This was achieved by the store man asking each operator their tool usage estimate when returning their tools”.
“We wanted to improve this process to not only reduce the workload for operators to not only remember their tool usage but also the time taken by the store man to record those details and for managers to translate the data into exposure information. We looked at how we could improve this process and the Reactec system addressed these objectives by automating the whole process so tool operators did not have to estimate usage and managers could spend less time documenting and more time reducing the exposure risk. The system also helped reduce the margin of error to provide far more accurate exposure data which helped us better understand the effectiveness of our controls”.
“One such example was by having access to more accurate exposure data, including real-time vibration magnitudes, we could assess which tools were best for particular applications. We consider Hilti breakers to be one of the best available and realised through the Reactec data we could replace a Hilti breaker TE1000, used for a wide range of applications for a larger TE2000. Even though it was more expensive it helped complete work tasks quicker and exposed the operator to less exposure during use so it was a win-win for project efficiency and worker health”.
“We also have noticed that worker behavior has improved due to their awareness of exposure from tools which the HAVwear provides at a personalized level and in real-time. Less people are now exceeding exposure levels we wish for them to remain below and there’s no repeat offenders. The more people that consistently use the system the better as it provides a more comprehensive understanding of HAV exposure risk, related tools, work patterns and project delivery to design the most effective and efficient measure of controls”.
“The Reactec data has provided the company with many other insights which include understanding which tools are over used to improve maintenance planning and tool rotation but also which tools are surplus to requirements. This has helped to understand tool requirements over the lifecycle of a project and to more efficiently plan future tool deployment.
An example is on current project at Battersea Power Station where we can track more accurately tool requirements from breaking out which required the use of mainly numerous breakers but later moved on to a heavier use of jigsaw cutters. Basically within weeks of deployment of the Reactec HAVwear system we have gained visibility on how to further reduce HAV exposure risk and to save on maintenance and hire cost”.
