Welcome to ISPC Safety Meeting 
Topics.
Today we're going to talk a 
little bit about heat stress.
And what is heat stress?
When the body is unable to 
actually cool itself by 
sweating.
What we'll talk about today is 
heat rash, heat cramps, 
heat exhaustion, and the almost 
fatal and mostly severe heat 
stroke.
Heat-related injuries and 
illnesses are considered a 
hazard to power line 
construction and maintenance 
workers.
These types of hazards are often
ignored until the worker 
is injured and becomes ill from 
the heat-induced hazards.
Consequently the possibility of 
the heat-induced hazards should
be discussed during the pre-job 
briefing.
And many times what do during 
that pre-job briefing is 
mention heat stress and then not
think about it any more
when the job goes on. 
So, we need to be more prepared,
especially in today's 
climates to make sure that the 
heat stress is something that's 
being taken care of.
Some of our hot work 
environments, routine work by 
power line crews in the summer 
months.
Strenuous work any time.  
It doesn't have to be 98 degrees
outside for our heat 
stress to take over.
Direct exposure to the summer 
sun for long periods.
Working in confined spaces, in 
small areas like vaults and 
things like that.
And then over exertion.  
Digging pole holes, things like 
that;
And then working in proximity to
heated equipment. 
Some of the heat off of that 
equipment might take us.
Some of the risk factors: not 
everyone is affected equally.
We have age, weight, physical 
fitness. 
Some old guys and overweight 
guys like me might be, might not
be able to withstand the heat 
like some of the younger guys.
Our metabolism, medications we 
may be taking.
Use of alcohol and drugs. 
You know, some of the guys might
drink a little beer the 
night before and are a bit 
dehydrated but they don't feel 
the effects until they start 
getting to a risk stage.
The air temperature, the 
humidity, the elevation, 
if we're working in high places 
sometimes the air is a little 
thinner and it's harder to 
breathe and get the oxygen to 
our blood that we need.
And then the rubber insulating 
PPE.
We've put our lineworkers in 
rubber gloves and rubber 
sleeves,
and we've not conditioned them 
to, you know, be able to 
withstand the extra that's on 
there.
Our FR clothing.
I'm wearing an eight calorie FR 
shirt right now, and it's quite 
heavy, doesn't breathe as good 
as a lot of other clothes, 
so that could also affect the 
amount of heat that I can take.
How heat causes fatigue. 
Since heat related injury and 
illnesses symptoms often appear 
gradually,
it's important to watch others 
for the onset of the symptoms,
and the sooner you can help a 
victim the quicker the recovery 
will be.
Heat rash, one of the symptoms 
that is unnoticed a lot of 
times.
It's a result from the body's 
natural cooling mechanism.
Body heat is released through 
sweating, and if the sweat 
ducts become obstructed a rash 
can develop.
So, like for instance, I may get
some little red dots on my 
hand where others it would come 
off as a little bit of a rash.
So if my skin is exposed to the 
sun a lot I'll get not so much 
a rash but red spots on my skin.
And it's a result from being in 
the sun for too long.
A rash can be dangerous, can 
become infected, so make sure 
we get the person to rest in a 
cool area, and then bathe the 
skin.
Get it cleaned off and get some 
damp cloths on it. 
Try to, you know, get the skin 
damp as fast as possible.
Fainting can be a reaction to 
the heat.
As our blood is circulated to 
the extremities it can 
accumulate in the lower part of 
the body, so fainting can occur 
if the brain doesn't get enough 
blood.
Lie down in a cool area.
I mean it sounds kind of crazy.
The person has already fainted 
and laying down, but the 
important thing is we need to 
get them to a cooler area and 
get them in the recovery 
position.
Muscle cramps are an early sign 
of the body trying to cope with 
overexertion, lack of
hydration, and possibly a lack
of salt or other minerals that 
the muscles need to properly 
function.
This early sign is a warning to 
slow down, rest, cool off, and
drink some GatorAde, Powerade, 
some other similar product.
Just remember that any Powerade 
or, you know, mineral drink that
you drink like that should be a 
one to three ratio with water. 
So every 16 ounces of Gatorade 
or Powerade that you drink, 
You should be drinking three 16 
ounce bottles of water to go 
along with that.
Drink 5-7 ounces of water every 
15 minutes.  
Thirst is not a reliable 
indicator. 
Often we don't get thirsty but 
we have to remind ourselves to
always keep drinking.  
Avoid drinking beverages 
containing caffeine or alcohol.
I mentioned alcohol earlier, but
one of the serious problems that
We have now is our caffeine 
drinks, our energy drinks, that
are so popular nowadays. 
There has been several 
incidents and illnesses from
young people who are drinking a 
lot of these and working in the 
heat.
They think they're invincible 
and find out that they really 
can't get away from it.
Heat exhaustion results when a 
person has lost large amounts 
of fluid by sweating.
Some of the symptoms are 
fatigue; some folks may get 
giddy, nauseous, and get a 
headache.
Heat exhaustion, some of the 
symptoms are sweating really, 
really bad.
The skin gets clammy, moist.
The body temperature usually 
remains about the same, but the 
sweating is what is keeping that
body temperature down.
The victim may get sick at their
stomach, vomit, lose 
consciousness in some extreme 
cases. 
Always try to move the victim
to a cool place.
Give plenty of liquids, and get 
some cool cloths, a cool
cloth, on the elbows, 
knees, and around the back of 
the neck--not cold, you do not 
want ice.
But just make sure that you get 
some cool cloths, and it would 
help cool down the blood.
Heat stroke is definitely a 
life threatening condition and 
is always taken seriously.
It occurs when the body 
temperature regulatory system 
fails.
Sweating becomes inadequate to 
remove the excess heat.
Skin becomes hot and dry. 
Body temperatures about 105 or 
more and is very, very serious.
I had a heat stroke when I was 
working. 
I had rubber gloves and sleeves 
on and just didn't notice that 
I had quit sweating.
It just happened that one of the
guys working on the ground with 
me--I was in the bucket--and 
one of the guys on the ground
was trained in CPR and he was a 
CPR instructor, and when he 
recognized some of those 
symptoms they got me out of the 
bucket to a cool place, and put 
the cool damp cloths on my 
elbows so I was already 
conscious again when the 
ambulance got there.
Heat stroke is very, very 
serious. 
The victim becomes mentally 
confused and delirious, 
convulsions, they can become 
unconscious.
So always get immediate medical 
attention. 
Move the victim to a cool area.
Soak clothing in water.
You can put a little water on, 
and again, do not ice down a 
person because that will put 
them in an almost immediate 
stroke.
Measuring and evaluating heat 
exposures. 
The heat index system is what 
they're talking about.
We may have a temperature of 90 
degrees.
It might not feel as hot if 
you're in a low humidity area,
but you get into a high humidity
area with a 90 degree
you'll be looking at triple 
digits with a heat index.
So the health and safety agency 
testing, we should keep up with 
what those temperatures are 
going to be so that we can
put that in our pre-job 
briefing.
Measuring and evaluating heat 
exposures.
Some work classifications: light
hand work, heavy hand work.
What we're talking about here is
strenuous work: doing some heavy
lifting, digging post holes by 
hand, things like that.
Having to shovel and tamp pole 
holes where it seems like an 
immediate work that we have to 
do. 
But let's just make sure that we
sit back, take breaks, you know,
do some of the heavy work then 
take a break and make sure 
everybody gets back hydrated, 
and, you know, try to keep the 
work moderated and under 
control. 
Some of the ways to control heat
stress: engineering controls.
Maybe we can get some, like a 
hydraulic tamp rather than a 
hand tamp.
That's some of the engineering 
controls that would help us with
heat stress.
Some of the work practice 
controls: when I was running 
crews I always had a 40 minute 
work and a 20 minute break when
it got really, really hot.
PPE.  Like I mentioned before, 
we put rubber gloves and sleeves
on these guys and that can 
certainly increase the heat 
stress that we're under.
Use relief workers.  Work in 
tandem.
We always had an extra guy on 
the crew that could take over.
And then pace the work so that 
we can keep up with everyone and
see what's going on.
Reduce physical demands. 
Use cool recovery rest areas.
Schedule work for cooler times 
of the day.
Many of our roofers will work 
6am to 10am and then take a 
break during the middle of the 
day, come back 6pm, work till 
8pm.
So if you can, try to schedule 
some of the work for the cooler 
areas, and take plenty of 
breaks during the really hot, 
hot times.
And again if you have any 
questions you can contact us at 
ISPC.
We're always available and ready
to make sure that your guys are
ready to work safe.
