6 safety precautions when moving heavy materials

manually
1. Safety Equipment – Workers should always wear appropriate personal protective
equipment. Wear gloves and long sleeve shirts for forearm protection when lifting items
that have sharp or rough edges. Protect your vision with safety goggles. When lifting
items that are very heavy, you should wear steel-toed safety shoes or boots to protect
your feet and toes.
2. Lift Properly – Use proper lifting techniques: bend at your hips and knees to squat
down to your load, keep it close to your body, and straighten your legs to lift. Consider
wearing a lumbar support belt for spine support and encourage leg lifting.
3. Add Handles – When moving materials manually, workers should attach handles or
holders to loads.
4. Get Help – When an oversized load is too bulky to properly grasp or lift, get a co-worker
to assist you to reduce risk to yourself and avoid damaging the material. If you cannot
see around or over the load, seek help from another employee to help you move the
material safely.
5. Blocking Materials – Use blocking materials that are large and strong enough to
support the load safely. Blocking material should be in good condition, and not have
cracks, be splintered, or dry rotted. When placing blocking material under a load, be
cautious that load is not released before removing hands from under the load.
7.Avoids distractions Remove any distractive material/object from the area before moving the
heavy loads.
6.Planning the lifting task Before performing a lifting operation, the workers should plan and
prepare for the task. They should make sure that they know where they are going. that the area is clear
of obstacles and they have a good grip on the load
9. Avoid back injuries by implementing ergonomics such as reducing the size and weight of lifted objects,
using a lifting aid changing the height of lifted objects or using a shelf.

Checked ground level Always be sure to be on level ground when

loading or unloading your equipment

Heavy Lifting work

 For lifting heavy objects, work as a team. Lift, walk, and lower the load together. Let one
person give the directions and direct the lift.
6. See OSHA’s Booklet – For more details about Materials Handling and Storage visit
OSHA’s website.

Workplace safety is important in all industries. In the aerospace industry, a shipping

department will encounter many hazardous materials, be responsible for expensive
equipment that is often obsolete and hard to replace, and move containers that can be
very large and heavy. Protecting yourself, your employees, and your customer assets is
very important to accomplishing your mission, and your customer’s.