How To Select The Best Fall Arrest Harness
As trade professionals we can often find ourselves working at dangerous heights. Some of us make our living working at these heights day in and day out, but whether you wear a fall arrest harness once a year or once a day, few of us ever experience an actual fall. So how do you know what makes for a safe, quality harness?
Well here at a Concord Carpenter we thankfully have never had any of our crew experience a dangerous fall. So without the experience of feeling the impact of an arrested fall or the feeling of all your weight on a harness while hanging and waiting for a rescue, how do you judge the best fall arrest harness? We went to THE experts in Fall Arrest technology, Werner Ladder Company, known for their #1 Brand of ladders, but now led by Daniel P. Ward has launched an innovative Fall Arrest line designed from a real user’s perspective.
Daniel P. Ward
With 23 years of experience in the movie industry protecting actors and stunt doubles during exhilarating stunt scenes Dan Ward is a guru of fall arrest, fall protection, and fall prevention. Dan knows the effect falls can have on a worker and their family and has used his expertise and passion to help safeguard the men and women who risk their lives to make a living. Dan has expertly trained Werner representatives to administer a free demonstration and training all over the country to ensure you, your co-workers, and employees are armed with the knowledge to select the most effective harness and wear and use them properly.
The Problem
Most manufacturers of Fall Arrest Harnesses are concerned about cost. This “race to the bottom” results in finding components of equipment to remove to lower cost and increase profit. The problem with this concept is that to get this lower cost you give something up, and that something can often be an important component that keeps YOU safer.
Fact of the matter that countless manufacturers focus on meeting basic regulations and costs goals rather than performance goals. And performance is the key to why Werner’s expertise is so valuable, they’ve worked with professionals who have made falling a regular part of their everyday experience and so they know the effect of those falls. We as trade professionals don’t respect the risks we take or the equipment we wear, due to the complacency of never experiencing a fall.
Don’t get me wrong I understand how you can become complacent working up high day after day, but unfortunately we forget that the consequences of a fall are never experienced, and certainly not frequently enough to have an impact on our behavior. Death, paralysis, and serious injury are realities in our line of work, so before you purchase your next fall arrest system, take a look at these features to ensure you protect yourself and your crew from serious injury.
The Best Fall Arrest Harnesses have these FIVE components
Strap Keepers
A Fall Arrest Harness should be worn snug to safely protect you from the impact of a fall. To maintain the snug adjustments, usually made on the ground, the harness should have TWO strap keepers for each adjustable component. One to keep the loose straps from getting in your way and one to lock in the adjustment from coming loose during movement while working. These inexpensive tabs help ensure your equipment maintains the proper settings to ensure the best performance in a fall.
Adjustable Chest Strap
Many Fall Arrest Harnesses are designed to accommodate the many shapes and sizes of the workers who wear them. An adjustable strap ensures you can place the chest strap along the sternum, if the strap is too high it could impact the throat of the user after a fall, too low and the user could fall out if the shoulder straps separate from the impact of a fall. This adjustment is also critical in a post fall condition to ensure the chest strap can be pulled down and away from the throat.
Butt Strap
The Butt Strap or Sub-Pelvic Strap should connect both leg straps and essentially cradle your butt, I mean Sub-Pelvic region. This feature is essential to appropriately transferring the momentum of a fall into the strongest part of your body, your butt and legs.
Back Strap
This simple strap that connects the vertical shoulder straps together horizontally prevents the user from falling out the back of the harness in the event of a fall or while in a post fall condition, meaning hanging from the harness.
Stitching, Labels, and Fall Indicators
Sure these are three things but I call these COMMON SENSE features. In the “race to the bottom” common sense features get removed to reduce cost, but as I mentioned before the trade offs kick in. In theses cases the trade offs reduce the utility, quality, and longevity of your harness. So look for these features when searching for the best fall arrest harness for you.
Quality and comprehensive stitching. Not into sewing? No worries, again this is a common sense feature, compare two harnesses and I guarantee you’ll be able to tell the difference between a poor stitching job and a quality one. Also consider where heavy duty stitching is located, connections that will experience the most stress should showcase heavy duty stitching.
Harnesses should be inspected regularly, part of that inspection should be of the label. Quality harnesses will be designed with the labels protected from the job-site, the weather, and regular wear and tear. This common sense feature protects the label and keeps it inspect-able for the life of the harness.
Fall indicators are a no brainer for a company that shares harnesses amongst employees. This feature protects you and your employees from a compromised harness that may have experienced a dynamic load during its previous use. These indicators reveal themselves as ripped stitching after folded webbing becomes undone after a fall.
The Solution
Unfortunately there is no perfect solution to prevent falls and there is no perfect fall arrest system. And this sentiment is exactly why we appreciate the work that Werner Ladder Co. is doing, at our demonstration it was clear that Werner challenges themselves to design the best performing harnesses for YOUR safety.
I was skeptical at first but when I asked if there are any products that Werner makes that doesn’t meet the strict standards we were presented, I was told to look at their more competitively priced systems.
And when I was looking for some affordable harnesses for a small roofing job, I found a $100 bucket from Werner that includes a 50′ lifeline, anchor point, lanyard, and harness. I used these harnesses for 2 or 3 days well before I even knew about the training Werner provided. After participating in the demonstration and learning how quality harnesses are designed I was still skeptical that this bucket would have an inferior harness and couldn’t wait to get home and check it out.
I was pleasantly surprised that every critical feature that was highlighted in the demonstration was present on my $100 bucket harness, even at such a competitive price. The difference between Werner and other manufacturers who may be winning the “race to the bottom” is that Werner Ladder Co. and their leaders really do care about us and the work we do before profits.
To Learn More
Checkout Werner Fall Protection for more information on Fall Protection and Harness Selection. Also look out for Werner representatives administering free demonstrations in your area!
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