As a result of our Job Safety Analysis and fall safety engineering, we were able to accelerate the construction schedule and make a reasonable profit. The fall protection system would enable the mill employees and future contractors to conveniently access, inspect and maintain their new equipment using safe fall protection practices.
In the mid-1980s I was a project manager/safety director for an industrial contractor in upstate New York. We were invited to bid by a local paper mill to construct an addition to their pulp mill to house a new chlorine-free bleaching process. The scope of the job included a three-story structural steel and masonry addition to the riverside of the mill, complex processing vessels and piping, a 120-foot-high venting chimney, as well as significant process renovations and additions within the existing mill.
I read the project specifications and plans carefully and soon realized that fall protection systems would be integral to a successful bid. Within several weeks of submission, our proposal was accepted and we were awarded the bid. Preconstruction meetings with the project engineer and pulp mill superintendent addressed the proposed schedule, material deployment and manpower allocations. For the next nine months our construction was not to interfere with the normal pulp production of the mill.