The UK Government’s Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has issued a safety notice for service lifts in onshore and offshore wind turbines.
HSE has identified that an absence of defined industry standards for the safe design of service lifts within wind turbines has resulted in discrepancies in the application of required safeguards by designers and manufacturers.
This is a potential risk to users, the HSE stated.
Hazards from the design, guarding, and positioning of controls should be identified and addressed by manufacturers or suppliers.
Duty holders who operate wind turbines, and employers of persons who operate or undertake maintenance activities on such wind turbines, should immediately check the design of gates, associated guarding, and the position of the external controls of lifts in use, it advised.
If existing guarding or the position of the external controls is inadequate, controls should be repositioned and sufficient guarding installed.
HSE advised that lifts should be withdrawn from use or should implement short term suitable control measures to mitigate risks until this work is complete.
The notice has been triggered by an incident where a turbine service technician suffered serious injuries when his hand was trapped between fixed and moving parts of a service lift.
The worker was able to place his hand into an aperture whilst sending the service lift down using the ‘one touch to operate’ external controls.
The external controls were positioned on the moving parts, and the design of the landing gates and associated guarding did not prevent him reaching the moving lift car which crushed his hand against the gate.
Design of the base and the upper-level landing gates and associated guarding of a service lift in a wind turbine did not prevent access to the moving lift car.
In addition, failure to follow the established standard for reach distances (BS EN ISO 13857) meant that the external controls were not situated in a position of sufficient distance from the danger zone.
HSE stated: “An absence of defined industry standards for the safe design of service lifts within wind turbines has resulted in discrepancies in the application of required safeguards by designers and manufacturers.
“This is a potential risk to users.
“Hazards from the design, guarding, and positioning of controls should be identified and addressed by manufacturers or suppliers.”