Priority tasks in the field of industrial safety for 2024

May 22, 2024

The Chairman of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee, Alexander Subbotin, has approved the Action Plan of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee for the implementation of the provisions of Directive of the President of the Republic of Belarus of March 11, 2004 No. 1 "On measures to strengthen public safety and discipline" for 2024 (hereinafter referred to as the Plan).

This Plan defines the main measures to ensure healthy and safe working conditions for citizens, strengthen law and order and labor discipline, and prevent deaths and injuries in case of fires and other emergencies.

Specific items of the Plan define measures in the field of industrial safety, the implementation of which is carried out by Gospromnadzor in accordance with its responsibilities:

1. Conducting inspections of construction sites on compliance with industrial safety requirements.

2. Conducting control (supervisory) measures regarding agricultural organizations operating seasonal gas-using installations (grain drying complexes).

3. Exercising control over the readiness and accident-free passage of heat and power facilities through the autumn-winter period of 2024/2025.

The implemented set of supervisory, preventive, and warning measures in the field of industrial safety helps to contain factors that affect the risk of emergencies, including cases of accidents and injuries.

1. Inspection of construction sites.

In the Vitebsk region, 205 economic entities operate 972 lifting cranes, including more than 40 organizations engaged in construction activities or providing rental services for lifting cranes.

When inspecting construction sites where lifting cranes are operated, organizational violations are primarily identified:

failure of managers and specialists to fulfill their duties to ensure safe working conditions for subordinates and the safe operation of lifting cranes, namely:

- operation of cranes with expired technical inspection dates;

- insufficient number of slingers at work sites;

- admission of untrained personnel to cargo slinging operations;

- persons responsible for the safe operation of cranes have not passed knowledge verification;

- in the places of work, there are no slinging schemes, graphical representations of cargo slinging and hooking methods, or a list of main moved loads with their mass;

responsible specialists and personnel consciously, and sometimes under duress, violate the requirements of technological regulations and work safety projects:

- cargo storage areas and sites do not comply with the work project;

- cargo slinging is carried out in violation of technological regulations.

At the same time, technical violations are identified that affect the safe operation of cranes and pose a threat to the life and health of the population, namely:

- absence or malfunction of the crane load limiter;

- absence of an anemometer;

- malfunction of the crane's and trolley's operating movement limiters;

- malfunction of removable lifting devices;

- non-compliance of the crane runway with the requirements of design and operational documentation.

Upon identification of these violations, proposals are made to the management of enterprises to suspend the operation of lifting cranes until the violations are rectified.

This situation at construction sites indicates that not all managers pay due attention to the organization of safe operation of lifting cranes, and industrial safety compliance is carried out formally.

For reference. In the Republic of Belarus, during 2023, 2 incidents and 10 accidents occurred during the operation of lifting cranes, including 2 fatalities.

2. Inspection of Grain Drying Complexes.

There are 60 organizations in the Vitebsk region that operate 124 grain cleaning and drying complexes (hereinafter referred to as GCDC), which use natural gas as fuel.

During the inspection of GCDCs by the State Industrial Supervision Service, violations are identified that are repeated annually, namely: the absence of trained maintenance personnel, the absence of contracts for the technical maintenance of gas distribution and gas consumption facilities, improper maintenance of operational documentation, and no training is conducted with employees on actions in case of an accident or incident (according to the accident localization and liquidation plan). Before the start of the harvesting campaign, all violations are rectified, and emergency situations during crop drying are prevented.

To ensure the accident-free and uninterrupted operation of grain drying complexes during the 2024 harvesting period, the owner and/or their authorized representative, before putting seasonal installations into operation, must ensure the availability of trained maintenance personnel who have passed knowledge verification, and persons responsible for the safe operation of gas distribution system and gas consumption facilities, current repair of gas equipment and automation systems, scheduled preventive maintenance of gasified installations and auxiliary equipment, verification of the operability of exhaust systems, availability of documents confirming the grounding and lightning protection check of structures, verification of measuring instruments at gas distribution system and gas consumption facilities, and availability of plans for localization and liquidation of incidents and accidents at gas distribution system and gas consumption facilities.

3. Preparation of Heat Power Facilities for the Autumn-Winter Period (hereinafter referred to as AWP) of 2024/2025.

There are 231 organizations in the Vitebsk region operating 633 boiler houses under the supervision of the State Industrial Supervision Service (boiler houses with a capacity of more than 200 kilowatts, regardless of the capacity of the boilers installed in them), of which 401 boiler houses provide thermal energy to the housing stock, social and cultural facilities.

During control (supervisory) activities to inspect boiler houses for their readiness for operation in previous years' autumn-winter periods, it was established that most entities approach the preparation of heat sources for the autumn-winter period with full responsibility. At these enterprises, planned preventive maintenance of main and auxiliary equipment is carried out according to approved schedules, timely checks of safety automation devices and instrumentation are performed, equipment is technically inspected, knowledge in industrial safety is verified for responsible specialists and maintenance personnel, and other regulatory work is conducted. However, there are cases where violations are identified; boiler house owners are given a deadline to rectify the violations and are issued negative conclusions, which indicate insufficient effectiveness of industrial control by persons responsible for industrial safety, and non-fulfillment of duties by persons responsible for the proper condition and safe operation of boilers. Information is provided to higher organizations and local authorities for response measures. Following the work (rectification of violations), all heat sources receive positive conclusions.

To promptly obtain a positive conclusion on the readiness of heat sources for operation in the 2024/2025 autumn-winter period, owners of this equipment must ensure the availability of a license for industrial safety activities, or contracts with specialized organizations, the proper technical condition of the main and auxiliary boiler house equipment, technical diagnostics of boilers that have exceeded their service life and timely assessment of their technical condition, performance of boiler performance testing, checks of boiler safety and control automation systems, the boiler house water treatment plant, availability of fuel reserves (main and backup) in quantities ensuring uninterrupted heat supply, availability of operational instructions for maintenance personnel, staffing of the boiler house in accordance with design solutions, knowledge verification for responsible persons and personnel, availability and proper functioning of boiler protections and automation systems, and the air control system for CO content.

Failure to comply with industrial safety legislation may lead to accidents and incidents at hazardous production facilities and/or potentially hazardous facilities.