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Archive for category: Construction

Crane collapses onto apartment block at Wolli Creek; residents unable to return home

August 9, 2017/in Construction, Cranes, News /by Jason Pohl

Three workers were injured when the crane fell, with the construction union condemning the incident as “not good enough”.

Two damaged buildings have been evacuated as well as residents in surrounding buildings, emergency services say.

Trains on the Airport Line between Central and Turrella have been cancelled as a precaution and Sydney Trains yesterday warned over 50,000 people could have their travel plans disrupted today.

“There may not be rail services to both the international and domestic airports [on Monday] morning,” CEO Howard Collins said.

Just after 9:30am emergency services were called to Brodie Spark Drive following reports a crane had fallen from one building and onto a second building.

The workers injured in the incident were responsible for the erection of the crane and all three are being treated at St George Hospital, one for a suspected broken leg.

Police said no-one was inside the crane when it collapsed.

Fire and Rescue Superintendent Josh Turner said the priority was making sure no-one on or around the site was at risk.

“At this stage we are going to keep approximately 20 firefighters on site who are working with a USAR [Urban Search and Rescue] team and they have electronic movement devices on all areas around the building, the crane and the scaffolding to log what movement is happening,” he said.

High wind in the area is currently making the situation more risky and exclusion zones will stay in place until further discussions with engineers, Superintendent Turner said.

Building managers are now working out where to relocate the approximately 200 people who will not be able to return to their units.

‘Could have seen many lives lost’

CFMEU NSW state secretary Brian Parker said early investigations indicate it was a mechanical or engineering fault with the crane that caused it to collapse.

“We are very, very concerned about this particular issue,” he said.

“In this day and age, and all the expertise we have, it’s not good enough.

“We have seen cranes catch fire, fall out of the sky, but not cranes that collapse onto buildings that have residents.

“Our fears are not just for the workers that work to erect these cranes, but also the public.”

The CFMEU is calling for a stop on any further erection of cranes until investigations are complete.

“It could have been a major disaster here today and we could have seen many lives lost,” Mr Parker said.

SafeWork New South Wales has been notified of the incident.

‘I don’t think I’ll ever live in a tall building again’

Mary Broadley who lives in the unit block the crane struck said she thought the whole building was going to collapse when she felt it start to shake.

“It was so noisy, it was just unreal the noise,” she said.

Her husband Bill Broadley said it “was like a bomb going off”.

“I went to take a look and the crane was right outside the bedroom window,” Mrs Broadley said.

The ceiling and the walls of the bedroom have cracked and the windows have smashed, she said.

“I could have been in the bedroom, or the kids could have been in there,” Mr Broadley said.

“It was so scary, I don’t think I’ll ever live in a tall building again,” Mrs Broadley said.

Original Post: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-06/crane-falls-onto-unit-block-at-wolli-creek-sydney/8779014

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/8779052-3x2-700x467-700x321-1.webp 321 700 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2017-08-09 15:46:482024-06-20 23:33:07Crane collapses onto apartment block at Wolli Creek; residents unable to return home

High above KC’s changing skyline, crane operators build downtown’s revitalization

August 9, 2017/in Construction, Cranes, News, Outdoor Events, Wind Power /by Jason Pohl

Perched high above a Children’s Mercy Hospital construction site, Carl Potter gently moves his left wrist and the 100-plus-foot tower crane rumbles to the right.

A push of his wrist sends the crane’s hook to the ground, where dozens of construction workers wait to attach a cement bucket to the crane’s rigging. They look like toy soldiers from this vantage point.

One of the four walkie-talkies used to communicate with the workers goes off, and he’s on to the next pick. Sometimes he eyes the drop and sometimes can’t see his work at all — relying on radio signals to navigate.

“It’s constant. There’s a tentative schedule, but I don’t eat lunch, I don’t have time,” says Potter, a tower crane operator for about 17 years.

As one of about 4,500 heavy machine operators in the Operating Engineers Local 101 union, Potter has been busy handling downtown Kansas City’s construction boom.

From his operator’s chair, Potter has a breathtaking view of downtown — a skyline crane operators have forged in the last decade — the Sprint Center, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts and the current construction of the city’s Two Light luxury apartments.

“Downtown’s growth has been the single most important thing that has happened to the construction industry,” said Jeff Holt, director of operations for Wilkerson Crane rentals, which owns cranes and provides operators. “Ten years ago you didn’t go downtown for nothing, and as an operator, the pride of driving downtown and seeing the things you’ve built, being a part of that change, it’s incredible.”

Potter, 41, of Lee’s Summit, has been up since 3:30 a.m. and has been overlooking the parking garage construction site inside the closet-sized cockpit since 4:30 a.m..

There’s a honey bun, oatmeal cream pie and a few empty energy drink cans in a neat row near his left arm rest. Underneath, a small cabinet door conceals a few water bottles filled with urine — it would be a waste of time to make the 10-minute climb down to use the restroom.

There’s an AM/FM radio built into the crane’s dashboard, but Potter doesn’t use it, opting for complete concentration during his typical 11-hour shifts. Potter tries to minimize distractions in a construction industry that accounts for more than 4,500 deaths annually, according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. He combines this discipline with more than 4,000 hours of required training by the union’s certification program.

Learning how

About 30 miles north in Weston, Stoney Cox stands on top of a 100-foot tower crane.

Cox, administrator of the union’s apprenticeship program, surveys the 220-acre training facility and casually leans over the railing. The facility is one of the largest in the country with a diverse landscape of hills and trees.

The Operating Engineers represent workers who use heavy machines, which include large dirt excavators, rollers, bulldozers and various cranes. The facility has more than 50 machines on the property to practice on. The international union often hosts conferences and training sessions on the property.

“Apprentices will take these cranes entirely apart almost a dozen times and learn every part of the machine before they even sit in an operator’s chair,” Cox says.

The three-year program requires 4,000 hours of training, including time in the facility’s classrooms and in the field working as an oiler. An oiler acts as an assistant to the large machine operators, maintaining the equipment, and in turn, the operator trains the apprentice on the job.

Nationally, middle-skill jobs, which require education beyond high school but not a four-year degree, make up the largest part of the labor market in the United States. In both Missouri and Kansas, there aren’t enough skilled laborers to fill the jobs, according to the National Skills Coalition.

Local 101 president Michael Charlton says the union has had a steady flow of apprentices the last few years to meet the area’s growing demand. They’ve struggled to recruit in the past, but Charlton says a more aggressive online advertising campaign and career fairs have boosted numbers.

“There’s zero cost to be an apprentice,” Cox said. “We use that a lot when we go to career fairs. Then parents come in and are asking, ‘You telling me little Johnny doesn’t have to pay for this?’ He pays nothing.”

At the same time, college is getting more expensive. The average four-year college student graduates with more than $30,000 in debt, according to the Institute of College Access and Success. As an apprentice, workers can earn close to $40,000 a year and can make $70,000 to $100,000 by the time they are journeymen.

Holt says high- school students aren’t exposed to certificate programs and trade schools. Often, he says, construction work is looked down upon.

“There’s a definite push that you need a college education to do anything,” Holt said. “This is a great living; I have done this since I was 18. I didn’t go to college — college wasn’t for me — and there are a lot of kids like that out there.”

“I know I can do my job”

Monica Confer always felt restless in a classroom. She stopped going to high school when she was 14 and opted for a GED certificate instead.

She held a bunch of jobs as a teenager and in her early 20s, running forklifts for warehouses and spending time in an auction yard. Confer had her son at 19, and the jobs weren’t cutting it.

“I needed better benefits for my son,” said Confer, 38, of Kansas City. “I could not afford insurance making less than $10 an hour.”

College wasn’t an option. She grew up in a union family, and her father’s friend recommended she apply to the Operating Engineers. She started as an apprentice in 2002.

Sometimes when she arrives at a new job site, she said, guys ask if she is the oiler; they’re surprised to see a woman in the operator’s chair.

“I’ve never had any big problems,” Confer said. “I think it used to bother me but I don’t even care anymore. Whatever, I know I can do my job.”

Charlton remembers a time when there were no women in Local 101 but says women now make up of about 20 percent of the workforce.

In 2014, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 9.8 million people working in the construction industry. Of those, 872,000 of them, or 8.9 percent, were women.

Confer admits a level of paranoia about safety on the job. She typically wakes up by 4 a.m. to get to a job site about an hour early, especially at a new site. She goes through 20 minutes of safety inspections and gets to know every inch of the machine.

She has gotten home, sat on her couch and panicked about whether she had set the crane’s brake. She’ll climb back into her SUV and drive back to the construction site to double check.

“Everybody sees the crane collapses on the news. I have never been on a job when there’s been a crane accident,” Confer said. “If something were to happen and you hadn’t done your safety checks, that’s your conscience, legalities aside.”

Unstable ground conditions, high gusts of wind and operator error are the leading causes of crane accidents, Charlton said. And with more cranes among denser populations downtown there’s less room for error.

Boom town

Tommy Wilson, an urban planner for the Downtown Council of Kansas City, marks the beginning of the city’s revitalization around 2003 with the approval and planning of the Power & Light District. The boom includes construction of the the Sprint Center, H&R Block’s headquarters and new residential spaces. In 10 years, close to $6.5 billion dollars has been invested into downtown.

Wilson says the streetcar’s construction sparked a second wave of development in 2013, with an additional $1 billion invested along the Main Street route. “Our next step and goal is to make the redevelopment sustainable. Sustainability is having a good residential population that calls this place home,” Wilson says.

He says around 24,500 people live downtown, and that number will grow to nearly 30,000 by 2020.

As more people move downtown, more retail and additional office spaces follow, attracting additional residents — it’s a cycle of growth that Wilson projects will continue.

“This downtown revitalization isn’t just a fun phase we are going through” Wilson says. “We want this growth to continue for decades to come.”

Author: Jacob Gedetsis: 816-234-4416, @jacobgedetsis

Original text and pictures:  http://www.kansascity.com/living/spirit/article165286002.html

 

 

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/wirelesswind-260x185-1.webp 185 260 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2017-08-09 15:39:332024-06-20 23:35:49High above KC’s changing skyline, crane operators build downtown’s revitalization

Court acquits Phinikoudes death crane operator

July 26, 2017/in Construction, Cranes, News, Outdoor Events, Weather /by Jason Pohl

Larnaca District Court on Thursday acquitted the operator of a 200-tonne tower crane that fell on to Phinikoudes promenade in October 2012 – killing a 65-year-old woman, injuring three others and damaging five cars – after the prosecution failed to prove the case.

The crane operator, Christos Peristianis, had been charged with causing death through reckless or dangerous acts, omissions of persons responsible for dangerous equipment and negligent acts causing physical harm and serious bodily harm.

In its ruling, the court said was Peristianis was accused on October 10, 2012, by want of precaution or by by rash or careless act not amounting to culpable negligence, of not completely unlocking the crane brake, meaning strong winds caused its fall, resulting in the death of Christine-Marie Coleman and the injury of three other people.

Any person who by want of precaution or by by rash or careless act, not amounting to culpable negligence, unintentionally causes the death of another person is guilty of a misdemeanour and is liable to imprisonment for two years, or to a fine not exceeding one €170.

He was also accused of, while he was solely responsible for the crane, having neglected to take the necessary precautions against any possible risk arising from such a motorised machine.

The T-shaped crane- 44-metres in length and 80 metres in width – was part of a construction site managed by a contractor hired by Larnaca municipality to build an extra two floors on top of the town hall on Phinikoudes Avenue. It fell on to the promenade during strong winds averaging between 6 and 9 on Beaufort scale, crashing down on a moving car containing Victor and Christine-Marie Coleman, 65 and 67, who were permanent residents of Vrysoulles village.

The two had to be freed from the mangled car by emergency services before being rushed to hospital. Christine-Marie died at the hospital from multiple injuries including haemorrhages in her brain and lungs, while her husband sustained head and brain injuries and internal cranial haemorrhaging.

A 47-year-old Iranian man lost his finger trying to flee from the falling crane on foot, and a 60-year-old Cypriot pedestrian suffered a fractured hand.

Eye-witness accounts said the crane’s fall was broken by the cars underneath, which changed the direction of the crane as it hit the ground, narrowly missing a kiosk with seven people inside.

The court ruled that prosecution had failed to prove its case against the accused, since it could not prove that Peristianis “did not take all the appropriate action to unlock the crane to rotate with the wind’s direction”. The fact that he was the last person to operate the crane, the ruling said, “does not prove in itself, and especially in a criminal case, which should be beyond reasonable doubt, that he failed to take the necessary precautions, which resulted in the crane falling”.

The court also ruled that the operator had partially unlocked the crane brake and therefore took the appropriate action that requires full unlocking of the brake.

“The accused actually did what the police accused him of failing to do, namely to deactivate the brake”, the ruling said. It added that the operator is not considered responsible because the brake was not fully deactivated.

The court also raised questions over the checks carried out on the crane by its owner and the state electromechanical services on the remote control with which the break was released. It was reported that about 10 months before the accident, the remote control was destroyed by lightning and replaced by one from another machine that was not tested for compatibility.

The new remote control, the court said, did not have an operator’s notification function that the rotation brake was released, and this gap created a breach in the prosecution’s attempt to prove that the operator was guilty. It also said that it took into consideration that the crane was last operated by Peristianis at 10.30am that day, while the accident occurred at 8.30pm.

The court also said that after the accident the crane was stored in the premises of the construction company that owned it instead of being handed over to police. It said that this raised an issue with possible tampering.

Author: Evie Andreou

Original source & photo :http://cyprus-mail.com/2017/06/22/court-acquits-phinikoudes-death-crane-operator/

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/accident1-770x321-1.webp 321 770 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2017-07-26 10:48:362024-06-20 23:40:47Court acquits Phinikoudes death crane operator
twisted bridge

Wind Monitoring Importance in Bridge Construction and Operation

April 5, 2017/in Construction /by Jason Pohl

Wind monitoring is key during all life cycle stages of a public bridge, from design and construction to operation and maintenance. Bridges are typically exposed to strong wind currents hitting them perpendicularly, and their sheer size results in very high mechanical loads induced by the wind. In addition, even if a bridge is properly designed according to the wind conditions on site, the wind itself may also pose a risk for vehicles under extreme conditions.

Designing Bridges to Withstand the Wind

Wind loads are a very important aspect of structural design, and monitoring is the only way to get a detailed and site-specific profile of wind conditions. This allows structural engineers to specify and design a bridge structure that is well-suited for the intended project site.

The case of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, which collapsed in 1940, is perhaps the best-known example of how the wind can destroy a bridge with a poor structural design. The Tacoma Narrows Bridge would show drastic movements in response to the wind, and the first time it was exposed to a 42-mph wind it started twisting until it collapsed, just a few months after construction.

Figure 1. Image of the drastic wind-induced oscillations of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
(Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Image-Tacoma_Narrows_Bridge1.gif)
After the Tacoma Narrows case was analysed, it was determined that the bridge collapse was the consequence of a structural design that was not adequate for the wind conditions on site:

  • The wind-facing area of the bridge was too high, causing significant drag forces. The replacement bridge was built with open trusses to minimise drag.
  • The bridge was too narrow and very susceptible to torsion forces. The day the Tacoma Narrows bridge failed, it was twisting on its longitudinal axis with an amplitude of over 25 feet.

Although nobody was killed in this accident, the material losses were significant. This case demonstrates the importance of having a detailed wind profile of the public bridge site before proceeding with its design and construction.

Safe Bridge Construction with Wind Monitoring

The risks that are present during bridge operation are compounded during construction, since the structure is work in progress, and does not have the mechanical strength as designed until completed.

Although construction activities can be programmed based on weather forecasts, the precision achieved is very limited. In addition, it may be difficult to justify missed deadlines due to unfavourable weather, potentially leading to project disputes. A web-connected weather monitoring station is far superior to weather forecasts, providing various advantages:

  • Decisions can be made based on live weather data as opposed to general forecasts.
  • If missed deadlines must be justified, there will be a cloud-hosted record to prove that the weather was unfavourable for construction work.
  • WINDCRANE can be configured to send automatic notifications to key staff members when unfavourable weather conditions are detected.

Wind monitoring also allows the project to be scheduled during a season of the year when wind-related risks are minimal. Since a detailed wind profile has already been gathered during the design phase, the months where average wind speeds are low are well-known to the project developer.

Safe Bridge Operation with Wind Monitoring

The case of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge is a drastic example, but wind can make a bridge dangerous even if it is nowhere close to collapsing. For example, vehicles such as SUVs and trailers are prone to turning over when exposed to harsh winds from the sides – the wind-facing area is large, and their centre of mass is higher than that of other vehicles.

Bridge movements may also pose a risk for drivers: Under harsh winds, some degree of structural deformation is normal and accounted for by design engineers, but the risk of causing an accident remains.

Once a bridge has been built, WINDCRANE can continue operating and delivering live data to the public authority responsible for the bridge. The same features that alert construction managers when dangerous winds are detected can be used to alert the corresponding authorities, who may block public access to the bridge until wind speeds have returned to safe values.

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Bridge.png 472 675 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2017-04-05 23:17:582023-12-28 21:19:54Wind Monitoring Importance in Bridge Construction and Operation

Construction Site Safety at the Windiest Time of the Year

August 24, 2016/in Construction /by Jason Pohl

There is a basic rule that applies for any construction project: preventing accidents is much cheaper than fixing the damage, and when the consequences affect human beings, the damage can be irreversible. The best contractors in the world know this, and that is why they deploy risk management as a company-wide process.

There are also weather-related risks that have a higher probability during a certain season of the year; they depend on external conditions rather than on the nature of the project itself. Of course, there are cases where a task-specific risk is compounded by environmental conditions, and extra caution is needed – crane  and plant operation during windy seasons is a prime example of this.

The weather is impossible to predict with full certainty, but it can be monitored in real time across many sites with a high degree of precision, and that is precisely the value proposition of WINDCRANE.

Why Measure the Weather in Construction Projects?

There are two conditions that every construction project must take into account:

  • There are deadlines to meet, and contractors are fined for missing them.
  • Weather forecasts are not completely accurate, so they are not a reliable basis to stop a project.

The combination of these two factors creates a challenge: ensuring safe working conditions at the project site, but without compromising deadlines. This becomes even more complicated during the autumn and winter months, for the simple reason that there are more days with harsh weather.

  • Stopping a project frequently based on weather forecasts creates the risk of missing a deadline and, since forecasts are not fully accurate, there may be no way to justify the missed deadline with the client. In this case, the contractor is fined.
  • However, the weather can’t be disregarded either. If weather conditions are assessed on-site and based on “gut feeling”, an accident is very likely to occur, especially if there are cranes in operation. Gusts, which are unpredictable blast of wind of short duration and high strength, can be particularly dangerous.

Project managers and site staff can take better decisions if construction sites are equipped with a monitoring solution that offers a reliable snapshot of weather conditions in real time, while providing mobile access and sending automatic alarms whenever dangerous weather conditions are detected.

Technology Built by Experts

WINDCRANE is built upon the technical know-how of Logic Energy, a company with a decade of experience providing monitoring solutions for applications as varied as energy efficiency, renewable energy, education and scientific research. Our technology is precise and sophisticated, but also extremely tough – thanks to its IP67 enclosure, the WINDCRANE kit is dust-tight and waterproof, capable of withstanding directed jets of water and even brief immersion with no damage.

With its rugged construction, WINDCRANE can be installed directly on project sites with the peace of mind that the unit will not be damaged by the weather. It can be powered with an AC connection, or with an optional solar panel if the site is inaccessible for the main power supply.

Even in the extremely rare event that a WINDCRANE unit is damaged beyond repair, data is kept safe: each unit comes with GSM connection to continuously back up data at a cloud-based server. Other than keeping data safe, this also makes it accessible to the end user at any time as long as an Internet connection is available. The cloud-stored data can also be used by a contractor to justify missed deadlines due to weather, avoiding conflict and fines.

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Europe-Autumn-Forecast-2016_large-2-260x185-1.webp 185 260 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2016-08-24 15:02:122024-10-01 15:49:19Construction Site Safety at the Windiest Time of the Year

How WINDCRANE Reduces Construction Costs and Enhances Safety

July 20, 2016/in Construction /by Jason Pohl

Being a construction manager involves taking quick decisions and reacting to unpredictable situations. When determining if weather conditions are suitable for construction work, there are many factors to consider:

  • Preventing damage to property and construction equipment
  • Ensuring safe working conditions
  • Rescheduling material deliveries and work
  • Compromising project deadlines

The traditional approach for managing weather variability in construction projects has been to schedule work based on weather forecasts, but it’s not a fully reliable method because forecasting is based on probabilities. The only way for a contractor to effectively manage the impact of weather conditions is to deploy real-time monitoring at all project sites, and then process the information into a format that allows quick and informed decisions. Data backup is also a key element, since it allows the contractor to justify any missed deadlines.

Figure 1. Monitoring the weather is key in all construction projects, especially in extreme environments.

WINDCRANE is a weather monitoring system designed specifically for the construction industry and other heavy duty applications. Each unit is built with a weatherproof enclosure and GSM capabilities, allowing data to be accessed remotely by project managers. The GSM connection is also used for automatic backups of the logged data.

Optimising Project Downtime

Construction work should never be authorized if the weather is not favorable, but it isn’t smart to suspend activities just based on suspicion that strong winds or rainfall are coming. WINDCRANE simplifies this project management challenge thanks to its GSM capabilities:

  • The weather conditions can be displayed on a web dashboard, or an application in the project manager’s smartphone.
  • Alarms can be configured so that the project staff is always notified when weather conditions represent a risk.

Basically, WINDCRANE allows project managers to decide whether construction work should proceed based on real-time measurements gathered at the exact project site. This prevents false alarms and unnecessary downtime, while ensuring safe conditions.

On the other hand, weather forecasts alone are very limited as a risk management tool. For example, if work is suspended because there’s a 50% chance of rainfall but then the forecast fails, the contractor will have lost a valuable day.

Preventing Disputes Due to Missed Deadlines

For a client, a project delivered late often results in financial losses. For example, if a commercial building is delivered a month late, the owner loses a large number of sales! This is why contracts often introduce a clause with financial penalties for the contractor in case of late delivery. These clauses make exceptions if the deadline was missed due to uncontrollable reasons, but only if the claim is backed by evidence.

Other than offering project site safety, WINDCRANE provides evidence for contractors who need to justify a missed deadline. For example, if the project was delivered late because excessive wind speed did not allow crane operation for several days in a row, the fine would not be applied.

Reliable information also helps prevent conflict with clients, which is often an issue when a construction company wants to justify a missed deadline without evidence.

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Untitled_large-1-260x185-1.webp 185 260 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2016-07-20 15:11:352024-10-01 15:53:18How WINDCRANE Reduces Construction Costs and Enhances Safety

Downtime disputes in the construction sector

March 22, 2016/in Construction /by Jason Pohl

DEALING WITH DOWNTIME DISPUTES IN THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

Anybody working in the construction industry knows that working at height is one of the most dangerous activities with statistics showing that most cases of fatal injury or severe injury are as a result of a fall from height. Most countries around the world have health and safety legislation designed to make working as safe as is possible and the regulations will usually involve carrying out a risk assessment before any work at height is undertaken. Working at height can be carried out on ladders, scaffolding, cherry-pickers and MEWPs (mobile elevated work platforms). Manufacturers of these types of equipment will provide guidelines on how the equipment should be assembled and used in order to ensure the safety of personnel using the equipment and it’s vital that these guidelines are adhered to at all times.

In most countries, the responsibility for the health and safety of the workforce lies with the building owner or site manager and it’s their responsibility to carry out a risk assessment before deploying both staff and equipment. When it comes to working at height, one of the vital issues to take into consideration is wind speed – working at height in high winds presents particular dangers which must be avoided or managed to ensure safety.

There are times when work at height will need to be stopped due to high winds and making that’s always a difficult call for the decision maker who needs to balance the need for ensuring the safety of the workforce with the need to bring a project in on time and on budget.   This means that the decision maker needs to be armed with accurate and up to date information on the weather at all times.

Using anemometers and wind speed recording software is the most effective method of providing this vital information. The best way of delivering this information to the decision maker is via GSM technology as it’s the most secure and reliable mobile communication method currently available. Because weather conditions are so changeable and the wind speed at ground level may differ radically from the wind speed at heights, an alert system is also vital to ensure safety on site. A system that will deliver instant alerts when wind speeds reach a certain level is an essential component of any wind measuring equipment nowadays.

Wind and weather conditions are totally out of our control and this often leads to costly downtime delays in building projects which may then be disputed. This means that project owners or project managers will require a wind monitoring system that provides a historical log of accurate data that can be used to demonstrate that decisions taken were correct. The data needs to be easily accessible in a format that can be presented during downtime disputes in order to give a full and accurate picture of what was happening with the weather at any particular time.

Making the right decision on whether or not to stop work can be stressful as it has such huge financial implications. However, keeping the workforce safe overrides the need to ensure that a project comes in on time and within budget.

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/scaffold_in_wind_1_d1e8e051-1b6b-4425-b1c4-1ae25ca1013f-1-260x185-1.webp 185 260 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2016-03-22 15:17:372024-10-01 15:54:25Downtime disputes in the construction sector
mobile app

Construction sector looks to cloud based solutions

January 5, 2016/in Construction /by Jason Pohl

SM and the Cloud – Revolutionising the Construction Industry

GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) is the standard developed by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) to describe the protocols for second generation (2G) digital cellular networks that are used by mobile phones. As of last year, GSM become the default global standard for mobile communications, operating in more than 220 countries and territories and taking a massive 90% of the market share.

The Benefits of GSM

  • Because there is GSM service in more than 200 countries it’s easy to use a GSM phone in any of these – a GSM mobile phone will work with any other GSM service anywhere in the world.
  • The authentication techniques incorporated into GSM make it the most secure mobile communication standard currently available.
  • GSM operates over multiple frequencies and is more accessible for international roaming.
  • GSM is SIM (subscriber identity module) specific, rather than handset specific, meaning that it can be used with any type of mobile handset.
  • GSM offers a more reliable data transfer service as it sends information by General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) which ensures performance at speeds up to 500 km/h.

Cloud computing is also known as on-demand computing – it’s internet based and allows resources, data and information to be provided to computers, tablets and mobile phones on demand. This means that the information stored in the cloud is freely accessible anywhere in the world 24/7.

The Benefits of Cloud Technology     

  • Cloud technology enables information to be accessed and shared anytime, from anywhere in the world allowing users to collaborate easily, make updates in real time and share information using any sort of internet connected device they like. This can reduce costs and increase productivity for businesses in all sectors.
  • Cloud computing provides a secure way of storing information that is secure at all times. The breakdown or loss of a phone or laptop does not mean that the information is lost as it’s all stored in the cloud and can be instantly and easily accessed via a replacement device.
  • Cloud computing means that there’s no need for office based servers and software updates are automatically rolled out at regular intervals so there’s no need for maintenance – your apps will work effectively at all times without any input from you.

These are two powerful technologies which when combined offer some of the most agile and reliable services available today. The construction industry is increasingly looking to cloud based solutions that deliver real time information across a range of devices. One of the areas that can benefit the most from this type of powerful technology is health and safety. Digital systems and solutions will deliver real time information on health and safety issues such as weather data and wind speed so that managers and supervisors can make informed decisions on whether or not to stop work due to safety issues. The fact that the data used to make these decisions is stored in the cloud means that the historical logs are accessible in the future across a range of devices for use in downtime disputes.

Digital technology is changing the construction industry and making it a safer sector to work in with up to date information and alert systems while historical data is providing contractors and site managers with the information they need to deal with downtime disputes.

https://wirelesswind.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/app_and_coll63-1.jpg 249 601 Jason Pohl /wp-content/uploads/2017/04/wirelesswind-logob.png Jason Pohl2016-01-05 15:22:492023-12-28 21:30:45Construction sector looks to cloud based solutions
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