Hard hats in MEWPs

ndp

Fun Director
Do you require hard hats in your personnel lifts/MEWPs? I am reviewing some of our safety policies and trying to make a decision on whether to require hard hats for those operating or riding as a passenger in our scissor lifts. Leaning towards requiring them, but couldn't find lots of info on best practices online. Academic setting, all student operators have been trained by an external company.

Thanks.

- Nick
 
I work in a school and was just trained a few months ago by a external company. Hard hats were not required by the school district or the trainers.
 
There are definitely people that are more versed in this but I always considered a hard hat something that could become a falling object. If I were going to require hard hats in a lift I would want it to be one of the Petzl climbing style with a chin clip.

There are good reasons to wear a hard hat in a lift such as additional work being done overhead or preventing injury on the equipment you are trying to reach with the lift.
 
Yep. 100% of the time unless it poses an immediate danger such as looking at something upside down where it will fall off. A Hard hat primarily there to protect you from bumping into sharp and hard objects. When you are in a lift, at height you are MUCH more likely to bag your head on that light or Batten, or overhead set piece, or ... If a hard hat is falling off your head that easily then it is improperly fitted.
 
Yep. 100% of the time unless it poses an immediate danger such as looking at something upside down where it will fall off. A Hard hat primarily there to protect you from bumping into sharp and hard objects. When you are in a lift, at height you are MUCH more likely to bag your head on that light or Batten, or overhead set piece, or ... If a hard hat is falling off your head that easily then it is improperly fitted.
As I recall, Washington state requires hard hats on lifts. It makes sense because you can run your head into something while raising the lift and focusing your attention elsewhere. The irony is I only tend to hit my head on things when my peripheral vision is blocked by the hat brim. In other words, when I have a hard hat on, I really need a hard hat.
 
As I recall, Washington state requires hard hats on lifts. It makes sense because you can run your head into something while raising the lift and focusing your attention elsewhere. The irony is I only tend to hit my head on things when my peripheral vision is blocked by the hat brim. In other words, when I have a hard hat on, I really need a hard hat.
One of the reasons why riggers are, typically, allowed to spin the bill on their covers. So your upper peripheral vision is not impaired AND so you don't have tilt your head back so far to look up.
 
One of the reasons why riggers are, typically, allowed to spin the bill on their covers. So your upper peripheral vision is not impaired AND so you don't have tilt your head back so far to look up.
The radio tower guys swear by the brimless hard hats (Petzl?) with chin straps. I'm not sure if they are rock climbing helmets, or actually made for tower and steel work.

It seems like hard hats used in other countries are more refined, comfortable, and provide more safety than the cheap ones found on our construction sites. If we have to wear the things, why can't we have better ones?
 
I’ve been wearing a petzl hard hat for years. Kask makes a good one too. It cheap, but stays on the head when looking up or down.

And remember, The OSHA rule for requiring a hard hat is not “whenever someone is working overhead” as most like to assume, but “whenever there is potential for head trauma”. Hence, OSHA requires hard hats in lifts a majority of the time.
 
The radio tower guys swear by the brimless hard hats (Petzl?) with chin straps. I'm not sure if they are rock climbing helmets, or actually made for tower and steel work.

It seems like hard hats used in other countries are more refined, comfortable, and provide more safety than the cheap ones found on our construction sites. If we have to wear the things, why can't we have better ones?

Petzl used to have separately certified hard hats for industrial use that looked identical to their climbing helmets. I think the difference was the sticker inside... IOW, the PSE met both sets of requirements but could not be dual-labeled perhaps?
 
Back when I was skinny and worked for a living I liked to wear my Petzl climbing hat as a hard hat. It wasn't approved but at that time nobody in the Entertainment industry wore hard cover anyway.
 
Back when I was skinny and worked for a living I liked to wear my Petzl climbing hat as a hard hat. It wasn't approved but at that time nobody in the Entertainment industry wore hard cover anyway.
Yep, and having head cover of any kind was better than not. Since compliance is more routine these days I've learned to ask Petzl users to "show me your sticker". ;)
 
We don’t officially require them for operators or passengers of lifts.

Where we do require it is people who are working on the ground, near the lift. This is especially true of the ground person who is assisting the person in the lift.
Also, on a busy site with other companies involved, we station a person on the ground, creating a perimeter, keeping people at a safe distance from the lift. This person is wearing a hard-hat.

A lot of our lift operators (myself included) prefer to wear a hard hat at heights, especially while rigging.
 
We are required to be harnessed into a MEWP and to wear an Environmental Health & Safety Dept-approved hard hat w/ a chin strap as well. We recently brought a slew of the Petzl vented hats for ourselves and our student workers because they are approved by our EHS dept as both a bump cap and a hard hat (in a theatre-setting, NOT necessarily on all construction sites), have a chin strap, and are comfortable enough to wear pretty much all day long. They're pricey, especially if you're buying a dozen or more at a time, but they're nice enough we don't have to fight too much to get people to wear them so we've managed to "engineer out" a lot of the student resistance to wearing PPE at height.

They've saved my noggin a half-dozen times already in the year or so we've been wearing them.

Good luck,
jake
 
One of the reasons why riggers are, typically, allowed to spin the bill on their covers. So your upper peripheral vision is not impaired AND so you don't have tilt your head back so far to look up.
Anyone can spin the harness around and wear it “backwards” AS LONG AS the hard hat is rated and labeled as such. If the hard hat isn’t made to be worn like that no one should wear it that way. Riggers included.

I like the Petzl style hard hats. A number of companies make them and they are comfortable and the ones I have looked at have the current ANSI rating on them. And you don’t have the brim to contend with.
 
My hard hat has a chin strap because I work at height often and don’t want it to fall off.

The answer: probably yes. Is there a risk of bumping your head on anything - including the railing of the MEWP? Is there a risk of someone dropping something on you? Then yes.
 
Thanks all for the great advice and experience. I made the change in requiring them last week and have gotten great adoption from a majority of our club. People have commented how it's saved them from knocking their head on truss and other things many times in just the last week they've been wearing them.

And in the anecdotal "what do you wear", I have a PMI Advantage (https://pmirope.com/product/pmi-advantage-helmet/) and absolutely love it. Much prefer it to my Petzl Vertex Vent, but YMMV.

- Nick
 
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We are required to be harnessed into a MEWP and to wear an Environmental Health & Safety Dept-approved hard hat w/ a chin strap as well. We recently brought a slew of the Petzl vented hats for ourselves and our student workers because they are approved by our EHS dept as both a bump cap and a hard hat (in a theatre-setting, NOT necessarily on all construction sites), have a chin strap, and are comfortable enough to wear pretty much all day long. They're pricey, especially if you're buying a dozen or more at a time, but they're nice enough we don't have to fight too much to get people to wear them so we've managed to "engineer out" a lot of the student resistance to wearing PPE at height.

They've saved my noggin a half-dozen times already in the year or so we've been wearing them.

Good luck,
jake
Who set this requirement ?. My research indicated there's no requirement for a harness when in a mast only lift, only used when in a boom lift.

As well, we only require a hard hat when there's work going on overhead and a potential for a dropped part or tool. When I'm focusing as example I do not wear a HH as I need to be able to see overhead.
 
Who set this requirement ?. My research indicated there's no requirement for a harness when in a mast only lift, only used when in a boom lift.

As well, we only require a hard hat when there's work going on overhead and a potential for a dropped part or tool. When I'm focusing as example I do not wear a HH as I need to be able to see overhead.

Employers are free to enact more stringent workplace safety requirements as they see fit.
 

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