Picture this — you’re working outside, atop a scaffold at a refinery. It’s 112 degrees on a mid-June Texas afternoon.
You’ve been working two hours straight and it’s so hot a sweat ring has formed around your protective eyewear. Underneath your helmet, your hair is soaked and sweat is running from your scalp down your back. You realize you haven’t had water in some time, and now you’re feeling weak, dizzy and your heart is racing. You need medical attention stat. You’re experiencing heat stress.
This concern was addressed by speakers and panelists during Beat the Heat: A Forum on Managing Heat Stress, presented by Brazoria County Petrochemical Council’s (BCPC) EHS Committee.
Coby Kayser, area safety manager with Turner Industries, outlined factors that increase heat illness risk including, but not limited to, dehydration, lack of wind or breeze to cool the body, certain health conditions and medications, high humidity, physically demanding work, recent alcohol or caffeine use within the previous 24 hours, history of heat illness unrelated to heat, over age 60 and non-breathable or minimally breathable PPE apparel or equipment.
Dow, BASF, OSHA: Heat should be nothing to stress about in the workplace
From left are moderator Raul Alvarado with Dow, and panelists Larry Toutcheque with Performance Contractors, Ashley Moore with BASF, Jorge Gomez with OSHA and Coby Kayser with Turner Industries.
"We have a heat stress policy and procedure, and it gives us some guidance and details on how we should be handling it — providing knowledge and training. Not just when they hire you, right? We all talk about it when they’re hired in, and we talk to them about it. But what do we do after that? We talk about it on a daily basis," Kayser said.
"As long as there’s been people working outside, heat stress has been an issue," said John Grantham, site director with Dow and BCPC EH&S committee chair. "I’ll never forget we had a young guy. It was his first day actually working in the chemical industry. He worked fast food the day before and then came to work on a paint crew. He didn’t take his break when everybody else took a break because he wanted to prove that he was tough and he could handle the work, and not surprisingly in the afternoon he fell out and left in an ambulance."
Years later, he said a worker at another plant, pushing beyond his limits, fell ill and was transported to the hospital. For him, this reemphasized the importance and why it concerns him as a leader.
"I think it’s one of the things that bothers me the most because I don’t have a perfect solution for it. There’s still more work to do. We haven’t figured it out yet — how to manage it. So, that’s why I think it’s a great topic for us to go over," Grantham said.
Speaker and panelist Jorge Gomez, compliance assistance specialist with OSHA, said on average, his office receives between 160 and 180 reports of fatalities each year, and about 50% of them are classified as a natural cause of death. Natural cause deaths, he explained, are when a coroner’s autopsy report says a person died of a heart attack due to a medical condition.
"We suspect that heat is one of those triggers, and that’s where a lot of the heat fatalities are hiding," Gomez said. "When you look at the age ranges of what these natural causes of death are, we have people between their 20s and 60s having these heart attacks. Definitely, nobody in their 20s, 30s or 40s should be having a heart attack, right?"
He added that OSHA has updated its programming, putting national emphasis on the indoor and outdoor heat index via the National Weather Service and the effect on working conditions. OSHA is also continuing its routine of conducting inspections and is responsive to company requests for heat inspections.
Other speakers, Darren Brooks, safety, health and security manager with Shintech; Travis Eldridge, safety training coordinator with Zachry Group; and Torrey Garrison, VP of EHS/leadership development with Performance Contractors, said their companies all have protocols in place, such as water distribution logs, readily available water, popsicles and electrolyte beverages, as well as an abundance of cooling PPE.
"What I encourage you to do is look at every avenue you can to take care of your own employees. You’d be surprised how they turn around and take care of you," Garrison said.
