Grace under fire

Central Market, under construction in Abu Dhabi, has won an award for site safety, an accolade partly put down to incessant training and tool box talk

“The absolute minimum PPE you can wear on site is a hard hat, a safety vest and safety boots,” explains Atkins health and safety manager Shaun Dent.

As he warns me to beware of uneven surfaces in order to avoid slips, trips and falls, I pull on my PPE while continuing to pay full attention.

“Stay vigilant. Keep looking around you at all times – don’t forget to look above, too.”

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Over the past few months, the region’s construction industry has taken several knocks in the form of mid-construction building collapses and on-site fires blazing into the night.

Just last week, experts told Construction Week that the region was at particular risk from fire injuries and casualties, due to the extra difficulties presented by building the ubiquitous high-rises.

We wanted to see just what could be done to prevent the risk of fires and accidents when working hundreds of metres up in the air, so where better to head to than the project recently named Abu Dhabi’s safest construction site at a prestigious industry awards night?

“This site has the highest possible safety reputation and we’re working hard to maintain that throughout,” continues Dent, speaking with pride about Aldar’s Foster + Partners-designed Central Market project – a 5.2 million m2 development of three supertall towers and an Arabian souk. Dent inducts every single worker that enters the site.

“You would usually face three different inductions but as you’re going to be with highly-trained HSE experts throughout, you’ll just have the one. We run through the protocol in the event of a fire – exactly where I have to go, how I get there and what I have to do – and then it’s time to meet the other HSE specialists on site.”

With over 6,000 men on site at any one time, Dent stresses the importance of remaining safe and vigilant at all times, as well as leading by example.

“That’s so important,” chimes in Geoff Bottomley, the health, safety and environment manager for Arabian Construction Company (ACC). “We obviously get a big influx of Asian workers. Yesterday, they were farmers, traders or fishermen and today they’re working 80 floors up on a construction site.”

How then do the HSE specialists bridge this safety and knowledge gap?