All use of scaffolds by FOX Corporation personnel must conform, at a minimum, to the following standards, unless a specific exemption is provided by the Environmental, Health and Safety Department.
1.0 SCOPE
FOX Corporation (FOX) is committed to the safe use of scaffolding during all work activities. The following requirements specify the minimum acceptable standards for the use of scaffolds.
2.0 DEFINITIONS
Competent Person: one who is capable of identifying existing and predictable hazards in the surroundings or working conditions that are unsanitary, hazardous, or dangerous to employees, and who has authorization to take prompt corrective measures to eliminate them.
Exposed Power Lines: electrical power lines that are accessible to employees and are not shielded from contact. Such lines do not include extension cords or power tool cords.
Fabricated Frame Scaffold (tubular welded frame scaffold): a scaffold consisting of a platform(s) supported on fabricated end frames with integral posts, horizontal bearers, and intermediate members.
Failure: load refusal, breakage, or separation of component parts. Load refusal is the point at which the ultimate yield strength is exceeded.
Large Area Scaffold: a pole scaffold, tube and coupler scaffold, system scaffold, or fabricated frame scaffold substantially erected over the entire work area.
Maximum Intended Load: the total load of all persons, equipment, tools, materials, transmitted loads, and other loads reasonably anticipated to be applied to a scaffold or scaffold component at any one time.
Scaffold: any temporary elevated platform (supported or suspended) and its supporting structure (including points of anchorage), used for supporting employees or materials, or both.
System Scaffold: a scaffold consisting of posts with fixed connection points that accept runners, bearers, and diagonals that can be interconnected at predetermined levels.
Tube and Coupler Scaffold: a supported or suspended scaffold consisting of a platform(s) supported by tubing, erected with coupling devices that connect uprights, braces, barriers, and runners.
Walkway: a portion of a scaffold platform used only for access and not as a work level.
3.0 RESPONSIBILITIES
In addition to required Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) Program responsibilities discussed in EHS001, EHS Policy, the responsibilities described below are necessary to ensure the effectiveness of the procedure.
3.1 DEPARTMENT HEADS
Affected Department Heads will ensure any use of a scaffolding system is performed under the guidance and supervision of a trained, designated “competent person.”
3.2 EMPLOYEES
All Fox employees will observe the operational procedures specified in Section 4.0 when working on or around scaffold systems.
3.3 ENVIRONMENTAL, HEALTH AND SAFETY DEPARTMENT
The EHS Department will:
1. Develop appropriate standards for the use of scaffolds in all Fox activities
2. Review and update this Procedure annually, or as necessary to comply with regulatory changes
3. Facilitate “competent person” training to members of the division staffs
4. Obtain and annually renew FOX’s Annual Permit with applicable Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) locations.
4.0 PROCEDURE
The following are the minimum requirements that will be observed in the use of scaffolds. Exemptions from any requirement must be obtained from 20th Century Fox’s Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) Department prior to implementation.
4.1 GENERAL REQUIREMENTS
1. Each scaffold and scaffold component must be capable of supporting, without failure, its own weight and at least four (4) times the maximum intended load applied or transmitted to it.
2. Scaffolds must be designed by a qualified person and must be constructed and loaded in accordance with that design.
3. For pre-fabricated scaffold designs, the approval of a qualified person may be assumed within the limitations specified by the manufacturer.
4. Each platform on all working levels of scaffolds must be fully planked or decked.
Openings between planks, and between planks and uprights, must not exceed one (1) inch, unless necessary to fit around obstacles. In such cases, the platform must be decked as fully as possible.
5. Platforms used solely as walkways, or used solely by employees erecting or dismantling scaffolds, may be less than fully decked.
6. Except where not possible, due to limited space, scaffold platforms, and walkways must be at least eighteen (18) inches wide.
This requirement does not apply to ladder jack scaffolds, top plate bracket scaffolds, roof bracket scaffolds, and pump jack scaffolds, which must be at least twelve (12) inches wide.
7. Care must be taken to secure cantilevered portions of platforms against tipping.
The platform must be designed and installed to support employees and materials without tipping, or access to the cantilevered end must be blocked.
8. Supported scaffolds with a height-to-base-width ratio (including outriggers) of more than four to one (4:1), must be restrained from tipping by guying, bracing, or equivalent means.
9. Supported scaffold poles, legs, posts, frames, and uprights must bear on base plates and mudsills, or other adequate firm foundation.
10. Supported scaffold poles, legs, posts, frames, and uprights must be plumb and braced to prevent swaying and displacement.
11. Scaffolds that are required to be secured to the structure, due to height and/or stability requirements, must be adequately secured at the prescribed vertical and horizontal securement points.
4.2 SCAFFOLD ERECTION
A competent person must supervise and direct the erection, moving, dismantling, and alteration of scaffolds. Experienced and trained personnel must perform such work.
1. Prior to each work shift, and after any occurrence that could affect a scaffold’s integrity, a competent person must inspect the scaffold and scaffold components for visible defects.
2. Any part of a scaffold that is damaged or weakened must be immediately repaired or replaced, braced, or removed from service.
3. Platforms must be maintained free of debris.
4. Employees may not work on scaffolds covered with snow, ice, or other slippery material, except as necessary to remove such materials.
5. Employees may not work on scaffolds during storms or high winds, unless a competent person has determined that it is safe to do so, and those employees are protected by personal fall-arrest systems or wind screens. NOTE: Windscreens impose additional loads on scaffolds and must be considered.
6. Tag lines or other means must be used to control swinging loads being hoisted onto scaffolds, or near enough to scaffolds where contact could occur.
7. Boxes, barrels, and other makeshift devices must not be used on scaffold platforms to increase the working level height of employees.
8. Ladders must not be used on scaffolds, except for large area scaffolds, when all of the following are met:
a. The scaffold is secured against any lateral thrust created by the ladder.
b. The platform is secured to the scaffold.
c. All ladder legs are on the same platform or are isolated from unequal platform deflection.
d. The ladder legs are secured to prevent movement.
9. The following clearances must be maintained between scaffolds and electric power lines:
ELECTRICAL LINE CLEARANCE REQUIREMENTS
Insulated Line Voltage Minimal Distance
Less than 50,000 10 feet
More than 50,000 10 feet plus 0.4 inch per each 1Kv over 50Kv
NOTE: Power lines do not include extension cords and electric hand tool power cords.
10. All personnel performing erection or dismantling of scaffolds must be properly trained in accordance with Section 4.7.
4.3 FALL PROTECTION
1. Fall Protection used during the erection and dismantling of scaffolds will comply with EHS 401, Fall Protection.
2. Each employee on a catenary scaffold, float scaffold, needle beam scaffold, or ladder jack scaffold must use a personal fall-arrest system.
3. Each employee on a single-point or two-point adjustable suspension scaffold must be protected by both a personal fall-arrest system and a guardrail system.
The fall-arrest system must be independently anchored to ensure that the worker(s) will be protected should a total scaffold failure occur.
4. Each employee on a crawling board (chicken ladder) must be protected by a personal fall-protection system, a guardrail system, or a 3/4-inch-diameter grab line, securely fastened beside each crawling board.
5. Each employee on a self-contained adjustable scaffold must be protected by a guardrail system when the platform is supported by the frame structure, and by both a personal fall-arrest system and a guardrail system when ropes support the platform.
6. A competent person must determine the feasibility of providing fall protection systems for employees erecting and dismantling supported scaffolds.
7. Where fall protection systems are feasible and do not create a greater hazard, such systems must be used.
4.4 GUARDRAILS
1. Guardrails must be installed before employees, other than erection/dismantling crews, use the scaffold.
2. Guardrail systems must be installed along all open sides and ends of platforms.
3. The top edge height of toprails must be between forty-two (42) and forty-five (45) inches above the platform surface.
4. Midrails, where used, must be installed approximately midway between the toprail and the scaffold platform.
5. Where screens or mesh are used, they must extend from the toprail to the platform along the entire opening between uprights.
6. Toprails on single-point adjustable suspension scaffolds, or two-point adjustable suspension scaffolds, must resist, without failure, a force of one hundred (100) pounds in a downward or horizontal direction applied at any point.
7. Midrails and other guardrail system components on these scaffolds must resist, without failure, a force of seventy-five (75) pounds in a downward or horizontal direction applied at any point.
8. Toprails on other scaffold types must withstand, without failure, a force of two hundred (200) pounds in a downward or horizontal direction applied at any point.
9. Midrails and other guardrail system components on these scaffolds must resist, without failure, a force of one hundred fifty (150) pounds in a downward or horizontal direction applied at any point.
10. Guardrails must be treated to prevent injury to employees from punctures and lacerations, and to prevent snagging of clothing.
11. Crossbracing may be used in place of a toprail when the crossing point is between thirty-nine (39) and forty-eight (48) inches above the work platform.
12. Crossbracing may be used as a midrail when the crossing point is between twenty (20) and thirty (30) inches above the work platform.
13. The crossbrace end points at each upright must be no more than forty-eight (48) inches apart.
4.5 PROTECTION FROM FALLING OBJECTS
1. When necessary, employees on a scaffold must be provided with protection from falling hand tools, debris, and other small objects by the use of toeboards, screens, nets, catch platforms or canopies.
2. When the falling objects are large, they shall be placed away from the edge of the surface from which they could fall, and must be secured to prevent falling.
3. Where objects can fall from scaffolds onto employees below, the area below the scaffold must be barricaded and access prohibited, or toeboards must be erected along the edge of all platforms more than six (6) feet above the lower surface.
4. If objects are piled over the top of the toeboard, the space between the toeboard and toprail must be paneled or screened.
5. Toeboards, when used, must:
a. Be at least three point five (3.5) inches high
b. Withstand, without failure, a force of fifty (50) pounds applied in a downward or horizontal direction at any point
c. Not exceed one-fourth (1/4)-inch spacing between the toeboard and working surface.
4.6 STILTS
When stilts are used, the following requirements must be observed:
1. Stilts may only be used on large area scaffolds.
2. When stilts are used on large area scaffolds with guardrail systems, the guardrail system must be increased in height by an amount equal to the height of the stilts.
3. Surfaces on which stilts are used must be flat and free of pits, holes and obstructions, such as debris, as well as other tripping and falling hazards.
4. Stilts must be properly maintained.
5. The manufacturer must approve any alteration of the equipment.
4.7 TRAINING REQUIREMENTS
1. Each employee who performs work on a scaffold must be trained by a person qualified in the subject matter to recognize the hazards associated with the type of scaffold being used, and to understand the procedures to control those hazards.
The training must include the following areas:
• The nature of any electrical hazards, fall hazards, and falling object hazards in the area
• The correct procedures to control electrical hazards
• The correct procedures to erect, maintain, and dismantle fall-protection systems and falling object protection systems being used
• The proper use of the scaffold
• The proper handling of materials on scaffolds
• The maximum intended load and the load-carrying capacities of the scaffold being used.
2. Each employee involved in erecting, disassembling, moving, operating, repairing, maintaining or inspecting a scaffold must be trained by a person qualified in the subject matter to recognize the hazards associated with the type of scaffold being used, and to understand the procedures to control those hazards.
The training must include the following areas:
• The nature of scaffold hazards
• The correct procedures for erecting, disassembling, moving, operating, repairing, inspecting, and maintaining the type of scaffold(s) in use (Grips only)
• The design criteria, maximum intended load-carrying capacity, and intended use of the scaffold.
The following training course: Scaffold Erection and Dismantling, conducted by the Contract Services Administration Trust Fund (CSATF), under its Safety Passport Program, is acceptable to meet this requirement
Training from other sources must be reviewed and approved by the EHS Department.
3. Employees must be retrained in the following circumstances:
• Where changes at the worksite present hazards not previously covered by training
• When inadequacies in the employee’s performance have been recognized.
5.0 REFERENCES
EHS 001, EHS Policy
EHS 401, Fall Protection
EHS 402, Demolition and Striking
EHS 408, Stairways and Ladders
6.0 ATTACHMENTS
None.