SmartSafety
The rates of job injuries and fatalities in construction sites
are still too high, with respect to other industrial working places.
Statistics show that there are a few main types of risk accidents
causing the higher number of fatalities.
The general contractor and all subcontractors are required to
provide a reasonably safe site, warn of hazards inherent to the site
and work, hire careful employees, coordinate job safety and
supervise compliance with safety specifications.
SmartSafety platform has been developed to support of health and
safety management in environments where very high risk levels are
usually experienced, such as construction sites, oil plants,
chemical plants, etc.
A Comprehensive platform for proactive safety management
SmartSafety platform aims at allowing a safety policy which
triggers warning alerts in order to prevent workers from standing in
hazardous positions or from accessing areas where there is a high
possibility of objects falling from overhead. The safety policy was
implemented to act as a virtual fencing technology, which was
interfaced with a real-time localization system and aimed at
alerting resources approaching and/or accessing danger zones. One
practical example of a high-risk situation may be activities
performed on scaffolding, which could cause tools and materials to
fall to lower levels; similarly, suspended loads are potentially
dangerous for workers occupying the space beneath the loads'
trajectories.
SmartSafety is mainly intended as a support system for
those inspectors in charge of the correct application of the
measures dictated by the Health and Safety Plan. Its application in
construction sites is rendered convenient by its low intrusiveness
and easy expandability with the real work progress. Integrated with a web-based service it constantly checks if workers
are accessing hazardous areas wearing adequate personal protective
equipment.
Alerts are programmable in case of violation of predetermined
control logics, enhancing standard safety policies and assisting
inspectors and safety managers in executing their tasks.
A total wireless system
The system performs real-time tracking of workers and their safety equipment using ultra-low power battery operated devices. Any device (with exclusion of the gateway) is totally independent by cables either for communication or powering. This results in a very flexible and efficient deployment and in an uninstrusive system that doesn't interfere with the site operations.
SmartSafety deliverables
- Continuous monitoring of the location of workers and evaluation of their interference with the fenced areas or with hazardous operations;
- Continuous monitoring of workers safety equipment (personal protective equipment) and evaluation of its adequacy to the operation context
- Warning inspectors and workers as the level of risk increases;
- Sending a warning alarm before workers are at risk;
- Monitoring of maneuvering of vehicles verifying that operations are performed by qualified persons
- Support for crane collision avoidance
- “Man down” alerting and fast retrieving of buried workers
- Real time management of critical operations (i.e. installation of heavy precast) and critical working area (i.e. overcrowding situation, machine operation area, etc)
- Check that critical operations are adequately directed by supervisor
- Monitoring of subcontractors and suppliers operations
- Assisted first aid or assisted evacuation
