Your best friend on the job, should be your hard hat. The work you do is demanding and dangerous and you deserve to wear it proudly. No matter what your hard hat is made of, fiberglass or thermoplastics, it is specially designed and certified by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) to protect you from high Impact. The shell of the hard hat is flexible enough to absorb some impact and transfer the rest of the impact through the webbing inside the hat. The webbing in the hat stretches and spreads the remaining shock through the head and body.
A hard hat does more than protect from impact. The hard hats also have a reflective surface combined with the space in the hat, to keep your head cool. Class A and B hats also protect from certain types of electric shock.
Your hard hat is carefully designed and will only work when you use it correctly. This means follow the tips that SafetyEd has listed below:
- Keep the space between the webbing and shell open.
- The straps should be adjusted to fit your head and not be too tight.
- Always check your hard hat for scratches, dents, cracks and any damage before wear.
- Drilling ventilation holes and paining over the hard hat can weaken the shell.
- Every time your hard hat receives a heavy blow it should be replaced.
- Avoid dropping or throwing your hard hat.
Around 70,000 workers are disabled by head injuries each year. Keep your hard hat on and your chances of staying ahead of those injury statistics are excellent.