Coaling and watering - working at height

Here is one option for mid/high level access to bits of steam locos. The sides at least.

 

So, what happens then if you have left a fire in the grate, and you once it's cleaned have to go in and inspect the firebox before you lay a new fire in it? I can think of several hazards from doing that, dust from the ashes, Risk of burns, if its still hot, from the old fire, lack of air flow, working in an confined space,

 

... which makes access to the low level awkward! To oil the rods etc. you'd be putting yourself in quite a tight spot.

Tom

 

Quite handy for the HV. Don't use a long handled brush.

One of the "great advantages" of leaving Europe was supposed to be the removal of what was perceived as restrictive legislation , specifically with regard to H & S. This overlooked the fact that the UK implemented European Regulations far more enthusiastically than its neighbours as the development and implementation of all sorts of rules and regulations fits very well into the British "jobsworth " mindset. Thus Europe got a bad name for the excesses of the UK government and its agencies in this particular area. Nothing will change and heritage railways will have to get used to working within ever more stringent regulation. I wonder how many of the readers have been involved in the construction industry where there has been a sea change of attitude in the last twenty years and practices that were once commonplace would now bring the site to a stop?

Whether it will be possible to continue our activities and achieve full compliance with the raft of regulations is debateable. Hazards can be controlled and risk reduced but remember that H & S law is one of the odd areas where you are guilty until you can prove yourself innocent and by definition, if there has been an accident then you are guilty ( Shades of Catch 22) no matter how careless or wilful the injured party has been. It is always the employers/owners fault. I am very glad that I no longer have responsibility for any of this. I wonder how many heritage railway directors appreciate the possible personal consequences of some untoward incident?

 

I'm sorry, but I have to respectfully disagree regarding wearing harnesses.

Harnesses are very much designed to be comfortable, and very much designed to prevent injury as part of a safe system of work. Otherwise they just would not be used. Having spent many, many hours working in harnesses in industry, rescue, training and recreational world, a correctly fitted & sized harness is barely noticeable unless working in suspension- where a clip on seat helps if sitting still whilst hanging on ropes for long periods of time.

With regard to fall arrest, yes inertia blocks are in the main *very* quick acting, however that is only the case when the lanyard or attachment system is under tension and- they are also usually reliant on being mounted directly above the access point to work effectively- which is where mistakes can be made limiting the effectiveness.

They do not stop you falling, they limit the distance you fall- you still have to fall to activate the inertia reel in exactly the same vain as yanking a seatbelt.

The fall arrest systems with an inline energy absorber as part of the attachment system work on the principle of damping the impact of a fall, they *do not* prevent a fall but limit injury and mitigate to an extent the consequences.

They are also reliant on good anchor positioning- with a poorly positioned anchor (eg at floor level similar to many roof tethering systems) with either of the above systems it is still possible to achieve a fall factor of 2- which as a minimum will cause significant bruising.

With regard to confined spaces and the management of- arguably the cab of a loco could be considered a confined space- I have certainly delivered training on sites where similar sized areas adjacent to kilns are considered confined spaces, so certainly pits, between the loco frames boilers, tanks could all *concievably* be assessed as such due to the presence of one or more of the specified risks (heat/fire being the main one for operational locos).

If there is the opportunity to engineer out problems- great, engineering controls should always high up in out risk management strategy, but understandably its not always possible.

Interestingly I have been delivering some training this last week and there have been a number of 360 excavators on site, all of which require the operator to climb either to the side of the cab, or on top pfnthe engine cover to conduct maintenance checks.

All of the newer machines either have fixed handrails/guardrails in place or pop up ones, where the older ones don't- that's progress.

Chris

 

I find it interesting that the SVR fit ground level fillers to their tender locos but not to the tank engines. Climbing up the back of most tenders is relatively easy as most have steps provided for this purpose. Many tank locos on the other hand can be far more hazardous to climb up to the tank top water lid, with steam, oil and hot surfaces all in the immediate vacinity.

Peter

 

This is currently one of the big H&S pushes within agricultural machinery, getting operators to clean steps and handrails (and use them correctly) to prevent slips and falls from height when mounting and dismounting equipment.

Chris

 

According to the ORR last week there have been five occurrences of people on heritage railway’s falling and requiring hospital treatment since July this year. I don’t have the details but at least one was from a coach roof and another from the running plate into a pit whilst cleaning a smokebox.

 

Not that long ago whilst on holiday in Devon I was watching men working on a hotel building project. It was behind schedule and they were working on a Sunday afternoon largely unsupervised. They were bare chested in shorts, no helmets and at leat one was wearing flip flops. They had to move a cabin with a telehandler, slung from the forks. Two of them had to ride on the cabin roof to balance the cabin. I was able to watch all this at close quarters as there was no fence separating me and other passers by from the workplace. I did start to film it but my phone battery packed in. H&S doesn’t exist in some more remote parts of the country. I’ve seen other examples but none as extreme as this one.

 

Deleted

 

That is similar to the sort of activity that I had when I referred in post #5 to rules being "applied" consistently. I was referring not to their legal applicability but to how workers often don't apply them in practice. Organisations are put to a lot of trouble to alleviate risks when in other places even worse risks are ignored.

 

I’m with Mellish, having managed construction sites. The rules are not enforced as they should be and are regularly flaunted in the building industry, particularly by small concerns. I assume there’s nowhere near enough inspectors to police the regs properly. Ditto excavations and confined spaces too.


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I was involved with H&S from the 1974 Act until I retired 15 years ago. For more than 10 years I had overall senior management responsibility for H&S in a large and complex organisation. It is my view that the original H&S legislation began fundamental cultural and social changes that have much wider reach than many realise. As with any such changes, the direction of progressive developments will be inconsistent and irregular both across different industries and within them. But, however desultory at times, the general trend has been clear for years. There will be more control, more prohibitions and more bureaucracy. The time for arguments about necessity is long past. If the heritage rail industry is to continue to operate in any way similar to historic precedents, it must modify procedures to accommodate developing H&S requirements in a timely and comprehensive manner, yet retain traditional working practices. I am not sure that circle can be squared.

 

It's all fun and games until you have to deal with a fatality.

I think the lack of enforcement is very much part of the problem - the HSE doesn't have enough day-to-day contact with (my field) the construction industry, meaning all they ever see is the bad stuff, which gives a certain attitude to both sides. (Like the police, when you see them now they are delivering unwelcome news, and that puts defences up on both sides).

WRT to watering, the test is as ever "as low as reasonably practicable". I've never seen any, eg non-slip surfaces on a tank top. What do you need to be on the top for? Could you remote operate the filler?

As no-one can positively engage with HSE, the posture on both sides ends up being defensive.

(Sometimes, the movement is it's own worst enemy though- a pic a while back of a loco having it's smokebox emptied. Over a pit. So you've got the basic fall risk of, say 6' and added a bonus extra fall (with bang on the rail on the way down). If that chap had fallen, I can't imagine any sympathy from the HSE, as there was no need to do that over a pit - in fact it makes the job worse as some poor bugger will need to get it out of the pit)

 

I suspect I agree. My concern about these changes - as with many others as regulation increases - is that the trade off between compliance and the purposes of the organisations will fall in in favour of regulation, and against achieving underlying purposes. Avoiding falling into that trap will require not just difficult decisions but also careful thought of a kind that is far from commonsensical.

 

I think your trap has been fallen into many times already.

 

I'm sadly unsurprised. I've seen that too pattern often around risk management and mitigation in my field (business IT) to believe otherwise.

 

I rather hated filling the tanks of a Bucket. It's a bloody long way and bloody long way to fall. Even back in the 80 and 90s when H&S was less stringent, I was rather shocked by this working practice.

 

A Bucket?

 

Austerity 0-6-0ST. High-pitched curved tanks that are pretty much the same width as the running plate is not a good combination. Side or pannier tanks are a much safer option, at least you're standing on a flat surface.

When I've visited Wolsztyn the crews don't go on the tender. They reach up with a metal pole and flip the filler lid open then point the water crane in the right direction. None of this messing about climbing up to put a heavy bag in a hole, all done from ground level. Coaling is done via a crane. But then they have basically standardised on a design of tender over the years and so it makes sense. How many designs of BR standard tender are there to accommodate different coal and water capacities, length, water scoops, etc?