Documents buildings 17 results

"Construction of high-rise buildings, large-scale apartment blocks, or construction in urban areas (especially busy downtowns) demands increasingly greater use of tower cranes. Therefore, the installation and dismantling of tower cranes on construction sites is an inevitable task, but also one of the most dangerous in the construction industry. Accidents during installation (including assembling and climbing) or dismantling of tower cranes incur the loss of workers' lives as well as delays in construction schedules and/or damage to buildings under construction. The aim of this paper is to investigate factors that contribute to accidents during tower crane installation/dismantling in Korea. Accident analysis and focus group interviews (FGIs) were conducted with people involved in crane work. A total of 38 fatal accident cases involving tower cranes occurred between 2001 and 2011. Accidents occurring during installation/dismantling of tower cranes accounted for 68.4% of all fatal accidents. Accident analysis identified “Not following work procedures” as one of the main causes of these accidents, followed by “unsafe acts of workers.” The FGIs investigation revealed the following factors that adversely affected the safety of the tower crane installation/dismantling: competence of the workers; roles of stakeholders such as principal contractors in the tasks; deterioration of tower crane components; and working conditions for conducting the tasks. These results may provide regulators as well as practitioners with insights for improving the safety of tower crane installation/dismantling."

"In 2008, the collective agreement of the Finnish paper industry was significantly rewritten. This case study analyses the influence of internal factions on the capability of the Finnish Paper Workers' Union to shift to a strategy of partnership. It is shown that resistance to change was especially strong with longer-serving shop stewards, and the strong division into factions implies limits to the extent of partnership in the Finnish paper industry."

"Qu'ils soient d'origine solaire ou artificielle, les ultraviolets (UV) sont susceptibles d'entraîner des altérations cellulaires responsables de troubles de la vue et surtout de cancers cutanés. Les travailleurs du BTP, qui exercent leur activité en extérieur, sont particulièrement concernés. D'autant qu'ils sont exposés à diverses substances chimiques, cofacteurs de ces cancers de la peau. La législation rappelle aux employeurs l'importance d'informer et de protéger leurs salariés."

"The use of asbestos has been banned in Australia since 2003. However, as a result of the widespread use of asbestos in the past, there remains a large amount of asbestos containing materials (ACMs) in older buildings. These ACMs include asbestos cement sheet walls, asbestos cement pipes and asbestos containing electrical switchboards. Construction and maintenance workers are likely to be involved in work tasks that may disturb ACMs. Therefore, there is a substantial risk of potential exposure to asbestos in these workers unless occupational health and safety (OHS) requirements on the management and control of asbestos are followed. To date, little research has been undertaken on these tradespersons and their awareness and compliance with OHS regulations relating to asbestos.
The aims of the current study were to determine in construction and maintenance workers:
• current levels of awareness of the risk of exposure to asbestos
• current levels of compliance with OHS legislative requirements for working with ACMs
• key perceptions, attitudes and motivations that act as barriers and enablers to compliance, and
• current level of exposure to asbestos in selected construction and maintenance work activities.
This study was conducted in five stages: 1) literature review; 2) focus groups with workers, employer organisations, unions and OHS authorities; 3) telephone survey of workers; 4) face-to-face interviews; and 5) atmospheric sampling. Four trades were selected as target occupations for this study: electricians, plumbers, carpenters and painters. "