Guest Post: Structural engineering on your site: the health and safety of support structures

Structural engineering is the designing and construction of structures which are built to bear or resist loads. During the construction of support structures, temporary supports known as falseworks are needed until the structure can support itself.

Falseworks are defined as: Any temporary structure used to support a permanent structure while it is not self-supporting.

Any collapse in falsework can lead to the collapse of any building work it is supporting. This can cause injuries or even loss of life as well as being extremely costly. As a result there are extensive health and safety guidelines in place to prevent against this happening.

As a contractor it is your duty to:

• Ensure falsework doesn’t collapse under load
• Reduce health and safety risks of anyone who may be working upon the falsework from falling objects or hazardous materials
• Make sure your workers are properly equipped to do their job

Many of the health and safety requirements relating to falsework are linked to the requirements for employees working at height. You should ensure that:

• All work at height on the support structures is adequately planned and necessary
• All staff should be properly trained
• All work must be appropriately supervised
• Correct health and safety equipment must be provided

All support structures must be designed specifically for the task at hand, by people qualified in the field.

The materials used must be undamaged and strong enough to be stable in use. All proprietary components must be the same unless approved by an expert in the field.

Other points that should be kept in mind when using falseworks are:

• Foundations should be secure and stable
• Special attention should be paid to making the structure weatherproof
• Structures should be built according to plans provided

Using support structures is often essential to modern structural engineering. For further reading please visit the official HSE website.

This piece was written by Mark Enright, a writer for Subcon Laser Cutting, leading UK based subcontract manufacturing service provider.