Light Plant Safety

Working along a highway or busy street is dangerous, especially at night. We have vehicles motoring through our work areas where the driver might be distracted by a cell phone, might be less than the best driver, could be half asleep, or even impaired by drugs or alcohol. Why make matters worse by setting up Light Plants improperly.    It is important to know before the work begins where your light is needed and get the light plants into position and properly set up. Set the light Plants up and angle your lights down. Too many times this is not done and causes problems with driving motorists and even the material hauling trucks. If the lights are not set up properly they can be blinding. And a blind drunk, talking on a cell phone is not who I want driving through my job site. Light Plants should be set up before dark to get them into position. Make sure they are fully extended and never leave a light plant at half mast. When it becomes dark, drive up and down all roads and observe if they are positioned right. That's both directions along the main road plus any roads that intersect the main road. Also recheck the work during the work as things tend to get moved around on a construction site.

Remember, it's easy for an approaching motorist to be blinded by a light plant and made it very difficult for them to see the lines in the road and tell where they are headed. Check that the lights are properly adjusted with the lights angling down instead of being straight out which can cause a problem. Also, remember that light plants can leave darkened shadows causing blind spots.   Use a spotter when backing and be safe.      Drive the roads, make it right, and make it safe.
                                                                                                        Contributed by L. J. Barker