ECN Forum Forums Photo Discussion Forums Violation Photo Forum Is this scaffolding?

I know someone who spent some time in Egypt as an industrial manufacturing consultant. His job was to get various metal stamping machines fixed and up and running. He insisted that the various safety switches that had been disconnected be rewired back to protect the users from fingers getting metal stamped and such. A whole factory full of this sort of thing.

Another time a worker got seriously injured, and needed to go to the hospital. Only vehicle avaliable was the owner's, as the only other vehicle was out devlivering product. The owner ddn't want to give my friend the keys to his car a first, but my friend managed to convince the owner to let him have the car so he could get the injured person to the hospital. After that all the workers considered my friend as a hero. Seems that management there considers regular workers as disposable throw away "items".

Productivity did go up once people didn't have to worry about losing fingers and such as much as before.

OSHA can be a real pain, but really bad conditions can develop without it. The scaffolding pictured above shows about the same level of care the Egyptian factory owner showed for his workers before my friend got there.

I shiver at the lack of diagonal braces between the uprights. I know there are gusset braces at the bottoms of the uprights, but it still looks shaky, even without the assorted barrels, planks, blocks,...

Muslim decoration; French influence; North Africa? Ah! France! - they were taught by the Masters!
There's a guy working on his roof right now only a couple of kilometers away from me, using home-made wooden scaffolding (2X4s) roped thro' his bedroom windows, ( I visualise it all tied to his wardrobes! ). It's 3 storeys up. Last week we saw another guy painting fibre-cement roof-slates with black paint on a 40 degree roof. He hadn't even got a roof ladder. Signwritten 'painters' van in the road. How he got up there is anyones' guess- the ladder must have been round the back, and he'd come over the ridge! He was halfway down the roof, working in tennis shoes. Mrs B. commented on his nice white boiler suit! ( Women notice these things!).
It's common here to see workmen perched on planks, 20 or 30 foot up, often not even remotely horizontal, hung off of things called 'cripples', which are hooked into the guttering and perch on the top rungs of a couple of ladders. That name is ominous isn't it?
Anyway, Muslims believe implicitly in kismet; if they take a tumble, or get a bag of cement on the bonce, it's the will of Allah, and is accepted with good grace. Oh, to be so carefree and full of undoubting faith.


Alan

I've heard the same about India. Jeremy Clarkson (Brits will recognize the name) did a show over there and mentioned the way they drive in the dark with no lights, pull out to pass on blind corners, etc. and adopt the same attitude that "Whatever happens is the will of God. If we are destined to get there safely, we will do so anyway."

Well maybe. But I reckon God also expects people the use the common sense with which he endowed them by not pulling into the path of an oncoming 18-wheeler with no lights.

Will of god huh? Yeah, I think he expects you to do your part as well. Possibly, Charles Darwin might have been one of his unrecognized profits. Anyone familiar with the Darwin Awards?

Paul, I remember that show! He went to a ( Hindustani motors? ) factory where they were still making Austin Ambassadors (?) from the 1950s. They had the press-tools from when the UK line closed- so worn out and knackered that none of the panels fitted. They had several 'fitter-wallahs' who bashed 7 varieties of crap out of the bodywork with sledgehammers till it went close enough to weld, then filled the huge dents with compo and sanded it all smoothe again!

Alan

Folks,

Let's please focus on recognizing the hazard here, rather than the 'who' and 'why' speculations. We don't want to get into discussions about Race, Religion or Cultures.

I'm sorry, but my take on all this is what does it have to do with anything electrical? It appears that they are doing some kind of stucco or mortar work. Granted, there is a hazard here..of falling down in a jumbled mess.

Perhaps this thread should be closed or deleted? IMHO

edited for spelling....

[This message has been edited by mxslick (edited 10-21-2005).]

Well, MX, I think this pic can be an appropriate springboard for discussion.

First of all....I expect all of us have done some occasional "field engineering" so we could "get'rdun" (as Larry the cable guy says).

A pic like this is something of a wake-up call- just how many chances do you want to take? When do you say "enough" and walk away?

I once had a boss who though it perfectly reasonable to "increase the rating" of an overloaded, tipping crane by standing on the bumper! That this gent had an extreme amount of education- but could still think like this- is truly scary.

This scaffold didn't get built all at once. These guys had to add to it a little each day. I suppose that tomorrow they'll place a chair atop- and stand on that!

Sometimes the guys doing really stupid things just need someone to tell them that they're being stupid.....other times, they insist on being so. Still, you have to try!

If they fall I feel confident in saying they asked for it.