Heat and Flame Protective Wear
Understanding the risks. What protection do I need? To understand what protection you need, you have to know what risks you face. The best way to do this is to make risk analyses in which you investigate, assess and document the risks of a specific work environment. In work areas that already have been analysed systematically, make sure you know the risk level before you enter that specific risk environment, and wear appropriate clothing. Protective wear, often referred to as Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), can have one or more CE (European Conformity) marks, which means the garment conforms to a number of regulations, standards and norms. In some scenarios and working conditions, protective wear can mean the difference between life and death for the wearer. How do I know the protection level of my outfit? First of all, you must choose clothing with the appropriate CE mark for the specific risk environment. CE-marked protective clothing provides different types of protection,
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such as against heat, flames and chemicals, as well as things like high visibility and anti-static properties. However, when working in environments that involve a risk of electric arcing, you must also ensure your clothing offers a level of protection that corresponds to the risk level of the work environment. You do this by adding up the total number of calories of all the layers of your outfit. Note that high-risk environments require that ALL garments you wear, including underwear and base layers, to offer protection against heat and flames. What sort of risks do I face? Working in high-risk environments involves, as the name implies, high risk levels. Arcs due to electrical faults can cause severe injuries and damage. Consequences include thermal injury, serious burns, electric shock, noise, UV emissions, pressure and shrapnel, as well as toxic exposure and the impact of physical and mental shock.
