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Health and Safety: Avoid the shock of electrical hazards
March 19, 2020 By By the CCOHS
Walk on to a worksite and chances are high that you’ll find electricity powering tools and light fixtures, running overhead in power lines, or flowing through underground cables. Electricity is so integral to the day-to-day activities of a workplace that it’s easy to forget that this commonplace utility is also a serious workplace hazard.
It takes very little electrical current to seriously injure or even kill a worker. According to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), direct contact with a circuit that can cause less than one amp of electricity (less than the current through a 100-watt light bulb) to pass through a human body can cause a worker to stop breathing (fibrillation). Direct contact with a live 15-amp circuit, the equivalent to a standard household outlet, can result in death.
In Ontario, from 2008 to 2017, 33 workers died from electrocution (non-intentional death caused by contact with electricity) or by the effects of electrical burns on the job.
Electricity at work
An electrical hazard is a dangerous condition in which a worker could make electrical contact with energized equipment and sustain an injury from shock and/or from an arc flash burn, thermal burn or blast injury.
Electricity seeks the easiest and shortest paths to the ground – when people or objects come too close to, or touch an electrical wire, they can become part of an electrical circuit. The amount of current that flows through the body is determined by the human body resistance, and the lesser the body resistance, the higher the current that flows through the body, which increases the risk of a fatal electrical shock or severe burns.
The human body can become a good conductor, conducting electrical current from a live wire to the ground, completing a circuit, if the person comes into contact with a live or energized wire. The voltage of the electricity and the available electrical current in regular businesses and homes has enough power to cause death by electrocution. Even changing a light bulb without unplugging the lamp can be hazardous from coming in contact with the energized or live part of the socket.
Injuries from electrical currents
There are four main types of injuries: electrocution (fatal), electric shock, burns, and falls. These injuries can happen in various ways:
- Direct contact with exposed energized conductors or circuit parts. When electrical current travels through our bodies, it can interfere with the normal electrical signals between the brain and our muscles. The heart may stop beating properly, breathing may stop, or muscles may spasm.
- When the electricity arcs or jumps from an exposed energized conductor or circuit part (for example overhead power lines) through a gas (such as air) to a person who is grounded.
- Thermal burns from heat generated by an electric arc, and flame burns from materials that catch on fire from heating or ignition by electrical currents or an electric arc flash. Contact burns from being shocked can burn internal tissues while leaving only very small injuries on the outside of the skin.
- Muscle contractions, or a startle reaction, can cause a person to fall from a ladder, scaffold or aerial bucket, and suffer serious injuries.
Roles and responsibilities
Employers are responsible for protecting workers from electrical hazards. Employers, managers, and supervisors should encourage workers to communicate any questions or concerns they may have about electrical hazards and be familiar with and able to identify electrical hazards to workers at a worksite.
When someone is injured in an electrical accident, call your local emergency services right away. Don’t attempt a rescue unless directed by hydro personnel.
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