Some construction workers will tell you that the hard hat is one of hardest things to keep on your head but they are a necessary part of safety. When you are on the ground and someone is working above you there is always a chance of something hitting you from above. Two of our construction workers were finishing out their day and they were lowering the buckets of tools down from a swing stage to the ground. One of the buckets of tools flipped over while being lowered to the ground and one of tools flew out. It did not hit the worker that was on the ground, it was, what we would call a near miss, but the hard hat would have been her protection if it had been any closer. Why take that chance?
When working on roadways, on boulevards, or in ditches, the Safety hard hat is the first thing others will see when driving past. The hard hat identifies that work is going on and tells motorists to slow down. Of course the safety vest is also to be worn on these types of jobs. It is also a crucial part of identifying the construction worker. Even the supervisor has to wear a hard hat and a safety vest when going on the job site to set a good example.
Several years ago, before a lot of the safety rules which are in place now, a supervisor on a job site had his hard hat save his life in a very unusual way. That supervisor was my Dad. He was always in the site trailer doing his job but on this particular day he had been called out to the job site where work was in progress. Like always as leaving the trailer, he grabbed his hard hat and put it on. When he got to the work site, one of the workers who had been causing problems and been warned before, was again causing havoc on the job. He had no choice but to fire him. After solving the problem, my Dad started walking back to his site trailer but still oddly enough kept his hard hat on. The worker that had just been fired came up behind him with a small sledge hammer in hand and hit my Dad on the head. His hard hat saved him from a major head injury and as I said before, possibly his life. Mind you, my Dad had a pretty hard head. The company he worked for at the time awarded him the golden hard hat award for his safety diligence.
Moral of this story is: When on a job site, wear your hard hat all the time. This includes workers, foreman, supervisors, safety officers and any visitors to the site. You never know what is going to happen. When attending one of our job sites you must have a hard hat, steel toed boots and safety vest where warranted. Where is that? Everywhere, you are on our jobsites. As you can tell, I was taught these rules early in life. As a child if I visited my Dad’s sites, you had to have steel toed boots on your feet and a hard hat on your head, to go anywhere on one of his sites. Remember this was before there was a Safety Association to tell us the right way, or any kind of safety rules like there are in place today. It was called common sense, and that is what safety is.
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