Page 20 - Occupational Health & Safety, March 2017

SUMMER HAZARDS/HEAT STRESS
hot, humid layer of insulating air that builds up around our bodies, which improves heat dissipation. In short, fans make our natural cooling mechanisms more efficient—fans cool people, not rooms.
Though fans don’t lower the actual air temperature, they do cre- ate a wind-chill factor that makes us feel as though they do. Air- flow creates a perceived cooling effect of up to 10° F. That means when the temperature reaches 77° F, which is where studies show productivity starts to rapidly decline, fans can make workers feel much cooler.
The cooling effect diminishes as the air temperature increases. However, a common misconception is that fans don’t provide a cooling benefit when the air is above 98° F. As long as the person is sweating and the air isn’t 100 percent saturated with humidity, airflow can still provide evaporative cooling. Combined with other precautions, like taking frequent breaks and drinking water regu- larly, fans can drastically delay the onset of heat illness symptoms.
However, when the later stages of heat-related illness set in, often the victim stops sweating. In that case, airflow alone should not be used to attempt to treat the symptoms if the air tempera- ture is above body temperature. The best course of action should be to cool the victim down as quickly as possible, such as by dousing them in ice water or moving them to an air-conditioned area. Fans can augment either of those strategies—blowing cold air over a person can reverse the effects of heat illness quicker than air conditioning alone. And, after dousing the person, a fan can be used to evaporate moisture from the skin to create an in- creased cooling effect.
Some fans can do more than simply create airflow. For example, misting fans combine water and airflow, which is one of the most effective methods for both preventing and reversing heat illness in outdoor working environments such as construction sites, agri- culture operations, mining, and industrial dock areas. Such mist- ing fans can create a mist so fine that the droplets are measured in microns, which is smaller than a red blood cell. The minuscule droplets evaporate instantly, producing an immediate reduction in air temperature of up to 25° F.
The larger the fan, the greater the area it can cover with the minimum amount of energy use.
Paul Murray, Director of Enterprise Safety Management at Opti- mum Safety Management, is a safety professional serving in the ca- pacity of business development and consulting with enterprise level companies. He can be reached at 630-759-9908 or pmurray@opti- mum-USA.com. Scott S. Moody, Business Development Manager at Big Ass Fans, oversees development and growth of industrial mar- ket solutions. He can be reached at 813-352-0176 or scott.moody@ bigasssolutions.com.
Big Ass Fans, www.bigassfans.com, makes fans ranging from
8 feet to 24 feet in diameter. Optimum Safety Management, www. oshasafetymanagement.com, creates safety awareness in leadership
and assists making safety a core part of its client companies’ culture,
with a “Team Approach to Safety”TM that is the essence of “the sum is greater than the parts” formula. Located in Naperville, Ill., it serves c3liMenEtsabsoythToreugcihonHaellayraingdAndatfiornJaallny.uary 2017 12/9/16 9:05 AM Page 1
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