Fatigue And Accident in

Industry
 What is Fatigue?

Fatigue describes a sort of “negative appetite

for activity”. Fatigue means a reduced
capacity for further work as a consequence
of previous activity where a person was
trying almost as hard as he could. Thus it
includes both mental and physical reactions
as well as the phenomenon of boredom and
monotony.
 The body has a natural rhythm that is repeated
every 24 hours – this is known as the ‘body clock’
of the human being. Human body clock regulates
functions including sleeping patterns, body
temperature, hormone levels and digestion. As it is
programmed for different levels of wakefulness,
individuals experience different levels of alertness
depending on the time of the day.
 When the human body clock is out of step, the
human alertness decreases and as a result
individual has a feeling of fatigue. This increases
the risk of making errors and causing accidents
and injuries, either in the workplace or on the way
home from work.
Aspects of Fatigue
 Decline in quantity of work for a given level of
effort;
 ii. Feeling of tiredness, not necessarily

accompanied by reduced capacity to work.

 Physiological change.(physiological change is

the accumulation of lactic acid in the blood

caused by the breaking down of glycogen, or
sugar, in the blood)
Environmental Conditions Affecting Fatigue:

 Various environmental conditions which tend

to increase fatigue
 Noise
 improper light
 and excessive heat
Noise
 Noise, or undesired noise, increases fatigue.
 Noise may cause sensory-motor, neuro-vegetative

and metabolic disorders; it has been named as a

cause of industrial fatigue.
 Prolonged exposure to noise above certain levels

causes permanent damage to Hearing and results in

occupational deafness.
FACT-It is believed that production increases under
conditions of quiet. One study of the reduction of
noise found that under normal conditions reduction
of noise will increase productivity by 10 to 15 per
cent
Lighting:

 Good visibility of the equipment, the product

and the data involved in the work process is
an essential factor in acceleration of
production, reducing the number of defective
products, reducing waste and preventing
visual fatigue and headaches amongst the
workers. Both inadequate visibility and glare
are frequently a cause of accidents.
Color:

 Lighting relates to the color of surrounding

objects and surfaces. The careful choice of
interior color schemes makes a valuable
contribution to good lighting. The colors
used at the workplace have psychological
effects. It is better to select pleasuring rather
than drab colors.
 The workers will see in this a clear sign that

the management is making an effort to make

working conditions more pleasant.
How to Reduce Fatigue?:

 The proper application of scheduled hours

and rest pauses can go a long way in
reducing the incidence of fatigue. Excessively
long work- day’s increases not only fatigue
but also susceptibility to sickness, accidents
and absenteeism. Reducing hours of work,
hourly schedules, the distribution of rest
pauses as to length, time and frequency yield
higher hourly production. 
Industrial Accidents
 Every year millions of industrial accidents
occur worldwide causing immense suffering to
the accident victim, their family and enormous
loss to the organization apart from being a
loss to the economy of the individual
countries. Considering the human sufferings
and economical loss due to the accidents in
industries, it becomes imperative on the part
of everyone to prevent such accidents by
removing or controlling the hazards in
industries
Causes of Accidents:

 Accidents were caused by

 unsafe actions
 unsafe mechanical or physical conditions or

both.
 Wrong Attitude
 Unsafe Actions
 Unsafe actions are generally classified under the
following groups:
(a) Operating without authority;
(b) Operating or working at unsafe speed;
(c) Making safety devices inoperative;
(d) Using unsafe equipment using hands instead
of equipment or using equipments unsafely;
(e) Unsafe loading, placing, mixing, combining,
etc.;
(f) Taking unsafe position 
Wrong Attitudes:

 Some of wrong attitudes are:

 (a) Negligence towards use of safety

appliances;
 (b) Absent mindedness;
 (c) Over-confidence or temptation to show

off;
 (d) Violent temper;
 (e) Nervousness;
 (f) Lack of interest in the job
Accident Preventive Measures:

 Plant Safety Inspection:

 Safety inspections constitute one of the

principal means of locating accident causes.

They help in determining the prior measures
necessary to guard against hazards
 Job Safety Analysis:
 Job safety analysis is a procedure of

analyzing job, for the specific purpose of

finding the hazards in each step in the job
and developing safety precautions to be
adopted
 The Management System:
 The root causes of accident are often related to
the management system and other operational
problems. They may be due to management
policies, procedures, supervision and its
effectiveness, training, etc.
 Accident Investigation:
 Immediate investigation of all accidents is
necessary to find out the causes and getting them
corrected. Accident investigation should not be a
fault-finding exercise but a fact finding one
END