What demolition can learn from quarrying

How drawing on lessons learnt by people in adjacent industries can improve worksite safety

Everybody knows that construction is dangerous. But works in dismantling and decommissioning carry a level of risk that usually far exceeds that encountered in general building.

This is why responsible demolition firms not only adhere to the legally required safety standards, but often go above and beyond them.

That said, safety levels across the global demolition industry vary dramatically.

While part of that is down to differing standards of government regulation and enforcement, it is also the result of a lack of knowledge – something the team at safety glass manufacturer Hammerglass are all too aware of.

EDUCATION GAPS

“Our problem is that the education part is often not taken so seriously,” says Florian Lauterbach, Business Area Manager -Automotive at Hammerglass.

“We try to be in every organisation that works around safety on construction machines, and we’re trying to use these forums to say: ‘Look, my dear demolition contractor, there is a European law that requires you to do a risk assessment on every machine you buy.

‘You need to look at your machines and at what can happen in terms of safety – for example, there can be big rocks, there can be small rocks, there can be metal parts and many other things.

‘And then you actually have to – according to the law, choose a product that protects your machine operator from all of these risks.’”

OLD WAYS OF THINKING

Florian reveals that he quite often gets the comment: ‘Oh really, I didn’t know that’ when he talks to companies about this.

“Everyone is very busy discussing electrification and environmental activities, which of course is very important, but operator safety should also be a top priority.

“And when it comes to safety, there is also an old way of thinking out there that says: Oh. Well, we’ve put in a glass window and a safety grid - we’ve been working like this for 20 years and nothing has ever happened, so what’s the problem?!’”

The problem is that something only has to go wrong once. And in an industry where the level of risk is primarily defined by the duration of exposure, the longer a site worker is on site, the greater the likelihood that, at some point, something catastrophic will happen.

And perhaps the only people that know this better than even those in demolition do, are those in the quarrying sector.

Jörgen Stjernkvist, Machine Operator at Scandinavian Stone

Machine operator Jörgen climbed out of the cab – mentally shaken, but not injured. This photo, taken shortly after the incident, shows just how big a 10-tonne stone really is.

The cab of Jörgen’s excavator is barely visible behind the boulder that fell onto his

The Hammerglass Guard, which is FOPS Level II approved, provides machine operators with greater visibility of the jobsite.

ALL PHOTOS: HAMMERGLASS

ROCK, MEET CAB

“I didn’t have time to think until it was over, the only thing in my head afterwards was joy that I had survived,” says Jörgen Stjernkvist, who found himself staring a 10-tonne granite boulder in the face, after it fell and smashed into the front of his excavator.

The incident occurred not too long ago at a site owned by quarrying company Scandinavian Stone, for which Jörgen had been a machine operator for many years. It was a typical Monday and Jörgen was cleaning out the dynamite troughs in between the granite rocks.

“It’s not an uncommon task for me,” says Jörgen. “But this particular boulder had a long crack that shot inwards and upwards that couldn’t be seen with the naked eye.

“And while I was working, the block came loose. It went incredibly fast. One second the lump of stone was stuck to the rock face, the next second it hit my windshield.

Florian Lauterbach, Business Area Manager -Automotive at Hammerglass

ALL PHOTOS: HAMMERGLASS

“I didn’t even have time to understand what had happened.”

Incredibly, Jörgen walked away from the incident with no injuries at all. Something he credits to colleague Sven Jönsson, the Health and Safety Manager at Scandinavian Stone, who had ensured the excavator cab had been fitted with an impact resistant windshield. “Safety always comes first,” says Sven. “Our goal is to find and use the best technology and method in each workplace, adapted to our needs.”

MATERIAL KNOWLEDGE

As no government authority or manufacturer could advise him on which products could provide the level of protection the company’s machine would need, when it came it to choosing the right safety features, Sven did his own research.

“I did my own analysis, starting from the choice of materials and the basic construction based on my knowledge of polymeric materials and glass.”

“The impact resistance of polycarbonate is well known,” says Sven. “That was the deciding factor for me.”

As such, Jörgen’s Volvo excavator was fitted with a Hammerglass Guard – a FOPS Level II-tested, patented and compact polycarbonate glazing unit that completely replaces a machine’s original, factory installed windshield.

While the frame itself is made of steel, it comprises a 12-mm-thick pane of Hammerglass polycarbonate and a 4-mm protective screen, also made of Hammerglass.

Hammerglass polycarbonate has been rated to no less than three distinct standards.

It has been resistance tested and certified to withstand sharp objects (DIN/EN 356, P8B), high-speed heavy objects (DIN/EN 15152-2), and the material is also certified to the ECE Directive No. 43 (R43).

Florian explains: “This is a special certificate that comes from the automotive industry.

“Every window in a car needs to be certified against this R43 standard, and it’s a European certification.

“What is very interesting is that there is a lot of optical testing done in the R43 – for decay, for sunlight, and these kinds of things, because if you’re driving your car you don’t want to have a yellow window after two years due to the sunlight.”

“So, this is why we also went for this certification. We are one of the few polycarbonate manufacturers worldwide that has passed this certification, because the optical quality of the product is so good.”

But what do these certifications really mean for machine operators?

HINDSIGHT IS ALWAYS 20/20

For Jörgen, who has been a machine operator since 1978 and has had his fair share of stone chips and glass breakages, it means he is still alive.

“The situation could have been completely different. I understand that when I see the picture with the boulder and the machine. I actually sat in it, with only a windshield in between.

“The boulder had a pointed shape at the front, which made it even more dangerous,” he adds.

“The tip pushed a little into the windscreen, but then it stopped. Without my Hammerglass screen, the tip would have caught me.”

According to Florian, the design of the steel frame also means that machine operators “do not need a grid anymore, because the Hammerglass Guard has the same certification as the metal guarding on construction equipment.”

Florian says: “The window system gives machine operators two major advantages: First, you are even safer, because if you have a grid with glass behind it, a small rock can still get through the grid spacing and crack through the window.

“You also have a much better view. If you take demolition workers, who’ve got a machine reaching up 20 or 30 metres to hammer something away, they don’t have to wrench their heads and necks around to look between the bars at what they’re doing.”

DEVELOPING FOR THE FUTURE

Of interest to high reach excavator operators, in particular, is that although Hammerglass produces steel framed windows for all sides of a machine’s driver cab, there is one area of the machine that the company, and its OEM partners, are still hoping to address: the roof window.

“You can have a Hammerglass window in the roof,” says Florian.

“But on the roof you have one problem. Usually, the window is not located directly above where the driver sits. The window sits about half-way over the driver and then there is the rest of the normal cabin roof.

The normal cabin roofs of construction machines usually only meet the FOPS (Falling Object Protection) Level I standard, which certifies impact strength against small falling objects such as bricks and hand tools.

“When you do a FOPS level II test [which tests a cab against heavier objects, such rocks and trees], the whole roof needs to withstand the FOPS Level II,” says Florian.

“And that is the problem. We can replace the original window with a Hammerglass window but, during the testing – and in a real-life situation, of course, if the projectile hits the thinner metal part, then the whole roof is going to fall through.

“That’s why people still have the grid guarding on the roof ”.

And while Hammerglass is working with its partner OEMs, who will have to adjust how they build their machine roofs, to find a solution, Jörgen says: “After what has happened now, I am even more grateful for the little things in life.” ■