Floor Openings

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Floor Openings
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Floor Openings

• Floor openings can be a killer on a construction
  project
• Consider the following cases in which accidents
  occurred

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• A carpenter on a floor above calls down to a
  laborer to hand him a sheet of plywood.
• Laborer walks over to pick up the sheet of
  plywood lying on the floor and picks it up.
• He takes a step or two forward in the act of
  standing the plywood up and goes sailing right
  through the hole in the floor the plywood was
  covering up.

Fudge!!
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• Two laborers are cleaning up a floor.
• They piled scrap lumber on a sheet of plywood and
  carried the plywood away.
• The plywood had been covering a floor opening and
  the rear man walked into a 25 foot fall to his
  death.

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Floor Openings

• OSHA defines a floor opening as An opening
  measuring 12 inches or more in its least
  dimension in any floor, roof, or platform through
  which persons may fall.''
• The biggest danger is a fall from an elevation.
• Another hazard is being struck by objects failing
  through the floor hole.

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Floor Opening Statistics

• About 40 of the serious injuries in the building
  trades are due to falls from one level to
  another.
• Hinze and Russell (1995), determined that falls
  clearly are the dominant type of accidents in the
  U.S. construction industry.
• According to the study, the 5th most common fall
  type resulting to death was through floor
  openings.

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OSHA Regulations

• Subpart M Fall Protection 1926.501 (b) 4. Holes
• (i) Each employee on walking/working surfaces
  shall be protected from falling through holes
  (including skylights) more than 6 feet above
  lower levels, by personal fall arrest systems,
  covers, or guardrail systems erected around such
  holes.

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OSHA Regulations

• (ii) Each employee on a walking/working surface
  shall be protected from tripping in or stepping
  into or through holes (including skylights) by
  covers.
• (iii) Each employee on a walking/working surface
  shall be protected from objects falling through
  holes (including skylights) by covers.

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Safety Procedures

• Avoid stepping on hole covers if possible.
• If you remove a section of a steel grating floor
  or a hole cover, rope off the area. These
  openings are particularly hard to see when the
  floor below is also steel grating.

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• Safely covering an opening with a piece of
  plywood requires more than laying the material
  over the hole
• The hole should be covered securely with a cover
  large enough and rigid enough to prevent failure.
• It should be marked with a danger warning.
• Every employee on the job should be warned about
  the hazard.
• Never leave an opening uncovered or unprotected.
  If covering a hole is impractical, guardrails
  shall be installed with toe boards.

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• A good way to check hole covers on safety walks
  is to kick the cover with caution. If the cover
  can be kicked off, it is not strong enough.

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• Elevator pit openings, stair openings with no
  stairs yet, and other large openings need to be
  protected by guard rails.

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So remember.

• Anything less than total safety is no safety at
  all. The total safety attitude must be kept in
  mind when floor openings are being covered.