Unexpected machinery start-up during maintenance remains a significant occupational safety concern, particularly when several workers are required to enter a hazardous machine zone. Lockout/Tagout (LOTO) provides the primary means of controlling hazardous energy; however, the final stage of the procedure still requires confirmation that all employees have been safely removed before energy is restored. This study proposes a fail-safe personnel verification system that adds an engineering control to the conventional LOTO process. A discrete-event simulation of an automated conveyor maintenance cell was developed using Python. The model represented 10,000 maintenance cycles, three authorized maintenance workers, two controlled access points, individual personnel identification, zone-occupancy monitoring, system-health verification, and a restart interlock. The simulation included normal maintenance, incomplete personnel exit, unauthorized entry, sensor failure, communication failure, controller failure, power interruption, false exit signals, and restart attempts during maintenance. A total of 30,000 personnel-state events were evaluated. The simulated system achieved 99.82% personnel-state verification accuracy and a mean detection latency of 184 ms. Of 1,000 unsafe restart attempts, all were inhibited. Eighteen valid restart events were unnecessarily inhibited, producing a false-inhibition rate of 1.80%. Eighty fault-injection events were also evaluated, and all resulted in a safe state. Under the same simulated assumptions, the conventional verification model produced 17 incorrect restart authorizations. The results indicate that automated personnel verification can provide an additional engineering barrier against unexpected start-up, particularly during multi-person maintenance. The proposed system is intended to supplement, rather than replace, established LOTO procedures. Read more

Nigeria's burgeoning real estate sector fuels economic growth via job creation, urban growth, wealth maximisation and sustainable development. The prospects and continuous increase in demand for real estate services is driving more people into the real estate professional. This underscores the critical need for the implementation of robust health and safety practices within offices where these services are carried out. In this study, the health and safety practices in real estate offices in Nigeria were assessed, focusing on the emphasis placed on safety and the availability of essential provisions. Employing a descriptive survey design, data from 302 valid responses across registered Estate Surveying and Valuation Firms were analysed using descriptive statistics. Findings revealed a general awareness of health and safety importance, but implementation varied significantly. While emergency routes, comfort, and restrooms received priority; staff counselling, insurance, and food amenities were largely neglected. The study advocates for proactive health and safety measures, stronger regulatory enforcement, and capacity building to foster healthier and more productive work environments. Enhancing health and safety in real estate offices is vital for employee well-being, organizational efficiency, and the long-term sustainability of the real estate sector. Read more

This study aimed to determine the influence of safety leadership on occupational health and safety performance within Nigerian oil and gas businesses operating in Rivers State. This study employed Lewin's technique as the theoretical foundation, drawing upon trait theories. The study employed a descriptive cross-sectional research approach, specifically targeting a group of oil and gas firms(IOGC and IOC) situated in the Eleme, Port Harcourt, and Obio/Akpor LGA of Rivers State. The study encompassed 3,800 individuals employed by two distinct oil businesses, with a sample size of 380 people. The sample methods utilised in this study consisted of purposive or convenient sampling techniques. Data collection was conducted by administering a questionnaire adapted from a reference document provided by the International Association of Oil & Gas Producers (IOGP). The data was analysed using SPSS 25, using statistical techniques such as ANOVA and t-test. The findings of the study revealed a multitude of insights pertaining to the qualities of safety leadership. In relation to credibility, a significant proportion of participants from both the International Organisation of Governmental Control (IOGC) and International Oil Companies (IOCs) expressed the view that their respective leaders exhibited a deficiency in this attribute. The majority did not view feedback and recognition as highly evident, indicating another lacking characteristic. According to the respondents, the organisations under research did not exhibit a high presence of collaboration, which is seen as a trait of safety leadership. The aforementioned principle can also be extended to the domain of communication. Therefore, the study concluded that safety leadership is critical in influencing safety performance within the oil and gas industry. Nevertheless, the results indicate that there exists a perceived need for more specific leadership attributes among the executives within the firms under investigation. Addressing this deficiency has the potential to result in improved safety outcomes within these organisations. Read more

Hajj pilgrims encounter a great deal of tough physical and mental stress. Overcrowding, extreme temperatures and electrolytes imbalance are common among pilgrims. Approximately more than 2.5 million people from different parts of the world gathered in the holy sites Makka. These factors trigger the increased risk for communicable and non-communicable diseases. This study discusses health and religious factors in an attempt to assess the mandatory health requirements for public toilets in the holy places at Makkah city, that can be translated into toilet design for Hajj pilgrimage at Mecca with the purposes of integration of modern technologies. Articles related to toilet problems faced by the pilgrims published between 2013 to 2018 in some selected data bases were considered in this study. Only 20 studies were included, encompassing 12,000 respondents out of 300 articles. An evaluation requirement checklist was made to evaluate whether the toilet facilities conform to the local and international public toilet standards. Randomly, about 242 toilets were selected and assessed for the availability of essential hygienic items from Mina (54%), followed by Arafat (26%) and Muzdalifah (20%). The proposed conceptual toilets design for Arafat, Muzdalifah, and Mina in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is not only applied for Hajj purposes but also as a model to the development of toilet design in all Muslim countries. Sustainable design proposal with safety provisions, accessibility, hygiene, ventilated, lighted and cleaned public toilets during Hajj rituals would more likely protect pilgrims against adverse health effects. However, a definitive conclusion could not be drawn due to lack of existing studies related to this area. The contribution of this study is that the health and religious factors are very crucial in the consideration of toilet design whilst not forgetting modern technologies of the future. Read more

Health and safety compliance in all industries is a serious issue of concern. More especially in small and medium size construction firms can never be over emphasized. This study was motivated by the reason of daily health and safety related cases on construction sites within and outside the Nigerian construction industry. The differences which exist in the anthropological culture of people provide the curiosity to determine how it influences the level of health and safety compliance of the construction artisans. Therefore, this study will determine the level of health and safety compliance by the construction artisans of different anthropological cultures: Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC). This study area is preferred because it has the highest share of construction activities and composition of the various anthropological cultures in Nigeria. A quantitative study; survey questionnaire was used by means of cluster sampling type of the random sampling technique. The data analysis was done using the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) 21. From the results obtained; it shows that the composition of the construction artisans of the small and medium construction firms in the AMAC are; Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba and the rest which are termed as “Others” in this study. The result shows that Hausa are the most populated, the “Others” are the next, followed by the Yoruba, and the last but not the least is the Igbo. The result shows that the level of artisans complains to the health and safety on small and medium construction firms is generally moderate. Read more