HOW DO LIFTING PLANS IMPROVE THE SAFETY OF LIFTING OPERATIONS ?
Most construction codes of practice recommend that a lifting plan is prepared and approved prior to commencing a critical lifting operation. These lifting plans should be prepared by a competent appointed person.
According to the UK’s Health and Safety Executive: “Lifting operations can often put people at great risk of injury, as well as incurring great costs when they go wrong. It is therefore important to properly resource, plan and organise lifting operations so they are carried out in a safe manner. Each of these elements requires a person or people with sufficient competence to be involved at each step.
These people should have sufficient theoretical and practical knowledge of the work and equipment in question, as well as the requirements of the law, to be able to do this properly. For complex and high-risk operations, the planning and organisation should be extensive and meticulous”.
There are also many standards and Codes of Practice that necessitate developing Lifting Plans.
Some of them include:
a)British Standard BS 1:2016-7121 (Section 5)
b)LOLER Approved Code of Practice and guidance
c)Construction standards of national Oil & Gas companies such as Saudi Aramco, ADNOC, Qatar Petroleum, Kuwait Oil Company, etc.