Lighting and Communication

Let us look at now lighting and communication. We will start with the lighting. We need to make sure the confined space is well lit, lots of different units out there. However, what is a big consideration is, is there a potential risk for an explosion? These type of environments will need a different type of lighting unit, one that is ATEX certified or intrinsically safe. And that is very important to ensure in the risk assessment you know exactly what lighting you require. Next, moving over to communication. Radio certainly is one way to communicate with someone, but we would only use radios normally if we are unable to maintain a line of vision because verbally will always be the best way to communicate with the team inside to make sure everything is fine. If however, radios were not able to be used, we might consider some other aspects. One could be the use of a whistle for an emergency. It may be the use of an air horn also to warn people. It could be down to a simple line, a talk system. But whatever communication we pick, we are going to make sure we maintain a constant communication with the team that is inside. Pick the right one for the working environment.

However, in an emergency situation, such as a power failure, while we have got maybe the suitable sufficient lighting, we need to have an alternative. So it is always recommended, have a helmet light. That way if something went wrong you would still have the ability to get out of that situation. And to finish off with the communication, same again, while we maintain communication with each other, we want to make sure we can also communicate from the outside to outer control, the emergency services. No matter what, we are going to make sure we can always communicate.