Posted By VIJAYANAND T R
Dear Sir(s)

There was an accident in one of our sites where our scope of work is carrying out an excavation by mechanical excavator for 1.5 Meters opposite to that a building construction was on there was a light duty scaffold erected for painting job which got collapsed and resulted in fatal accident.

Whats is the Safe distance for carrying an excavation when there is erected standard scaffold. Pl give me a legal regulation or any standard which specifies this would be higly appreciated.

Regards,

Vijay

Posted By garyh
I don't know of any defined safe distance - you might have actually need to have the scaffold near or over an excavation.

I take it that the excavation collapsed, causing the scaffold to fail?

There are two issues, namely that

- excavations should be stable and if required, supported (eg shored)such that they are stable

- scaffolds should only be erected on stable ground or on a stable support if the ground is uneven

Try HSE guidance

http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg344.pdf also HSE publication Health and Safety in Excavations: Be safe and shore, HSG 185, ISBN 0 7176 1563 4, price £8.50

Hope this helps