Posted By Alan Hoskins
"On construction sites different hard hat colors often signify different roles: White for supervisors, blue for technical advisors and yellow for workmen." (source Wikepedia)

Does this apply generally in the UK construction industry or is it a US thing? I haven't noticed any general compliance personally.

If it does, though, what colour does (or should) the Safety Advisor wear?

Seriously...

Alan

Posted By B Smart
In the Offshore Industry Safety Reps wear blue hats, people new to the rig wear green hats and everyone else wear white hats.

B. Smart

Posted By Dave Wilson
It does not matter as long as it complies with the relevant CE Mark.

Posted By William
Here is my experience of hard hats from both the offshore industry and onshore.

Offshore people new to an instalation where green hats for the first 3 months, then it will be a platform specific colour which is often white, but if you are on a shell rig it is yellow, although on the drilling side you still get some people who have been known to wear silver or gold hats (usually drillers), on one instalation i was on recently the safety reps wore red hats to identify them to people new to the instalation so they could assist if needed.

Last year in a Naval dockyard the colour coding was as follows, white was for supervisors (easy to spot and avoid), trades wore blue hats and slingers/banksmen wore orange hats so they could be clearly identified by the crane operator.

In my opinion the offshore industry standard of green hats for all people new to an installation (no matter who they are) is a very good idea as it clearly identifies someone who may not be familiar with the installation, also offshore we use cranes very often and we don't have any problems identifying the banksmen, if there was an issue they should be wearing a high visibility orange vest to identify them. I think that all work sites in the UK should adopt the idea of a green hat for people new to a site for 3 months, as someone who is new to a site is more likely to have an accident. I think that white hats for supervisors and blue for trades can be useful, as red hats for safety reps. These could be a company/workplace preference, but i strongly believe that green hats for people new to a site would cut accidents and incidents.

Posted By Ken Taylor
On the basis that the 'good guys' in the old cowboy films would wear white hats, I have always gone for that colour. White hats seem to command more respect for the wearer - but it also helps if you wear a tie and carry a clip-board.

In my local government days, the H&S people wore white, the fire marshals had red and the first-aiders had green. Contractor's employees tend to have whatever is their employer's chosen colour.

Posted By Raymond Rapp
..in the rail industry they wear white hard hats (and orange hi-vis).

Ray

Posted By Ian G. Minty
In my experience in the construction industry, it is best to avoid the shirt and tie and clipboard image.

This is how they see management - they resent clip boards and one comment that I received once was "men in ties - they tell lies".

This was an unfortunate product of the culture that had been created by management.

Posted By Merv Newman
Interesting discussion. I've seen all sorts of styles and colours of hard hats and never really thought about it as a system of identification. (does a chrome plated US army helmet comply with CE ? Or a laminated wood helmet ? Seen 'em both)

Would it be a good idea if we could encourage people to standardise on the lines suggested above ? No legislation, just "best practice"

Merv

Every time I've been down a mine everyone wore white hard hats but they did give "visitors" white overalls - easier to find when the lights gave out. As they did. Often.

British Rail (goes back a bit, 1990 ?) required hi-vis vests and a permanent escort but no hard hat at the time.

Posted By Alan Hoskins
Not much of a consensus then...

I have always used white, but wondered whether a change might now be due.

Hi-Vis yellow could be a little over the top though!

Thanks to everyone.

Alan

Posted By David A Simms
When I worked for the City of Toronto there was a rigid protocol for hardhat colours.

yellow = hourly worker, union member
white = supervisor
orange = electrician
green = professional engineer
blue = visitor to the plant/site
red = fire warden

When I worked at Ontario Hydro, everyone wore orange hats. During fires/drills, the fire wardens wore green hats.

In most workplaces in Canada the tradition of yellow = worker, white = boss is well entrenched.

Posted By Ian Mitchell
In the rail industry, high vis clothing must be orange only and display the sponsor's name clearly, and comply with the relevant BS EN. Helmets are white.

As has been mentioned, red, yellow and green are not permitted as they may be mistaken for a signal aspect by the driver.

In the BR days, from about 1965, train ends were painted bright yellow to enable lookouts to spot them from miles away, but since privatisation this seems to be forgotten about and they are now all colours under the sun.

I used to work on a normal building site that had white helmets for all bar the banksmen who wore red for the crane driver to see - I wasn't aware that there are standards which would be a great idea.

Posted By Davelfc
The Company I work for wear the following colours:

Red - Site Managers & General Foreman/Supervisors.
Orange - Slinger/Signaller Bankman (also orange banksman jackets.
White - Site workers and visitors
Safety - Green.

We have found this works very well for the subbies and management as they can see at a glance those in charge and those going about daily works.

From a supervision point of view it is good for me as I can see that the trades have supervisors and who to talk to when the need arises.

This has improved communication on site, also for contractor progress and worker engagement meetings we see the level of attendee.

There is as Mike mentioned issues with the colours of hard hats on first day, but we have resolved this by inserting it in the pre contract minutes as an agenda point, the pre contract meeting occurs usually two or three weeks before that subbie mobilises and they have plenty of time to source white hats etc.

When they arrive for our planned inductions if they are not compliant then they simply go away until they are correctly dressed for site.

This works very well as it sets the standards.

I conducted a briefing two weeks ago to almost 200 site personnel, in the basement of one of our sites, it was only then that it dawned on me how well it was received and policed, with all looking uni formal, the only differences where the company logo's which we only allow actual company logos for the companies on site or blank

It makes a statement, has a knock on effect with other items its so easy to police as it is visually right or wrong.

Dave