Lessons Learnt from
Investigation of
Construction Accidents
By Ir. Dr Mohd Fairuz Ab Rahman,
Mohd Fiqri Mohd Hanafi
Department of Occupational Safety and Health
T
he safety of construction sites is considered
a significant challenge in occupational
safety and health (OSH). In 2017, 183
people died while working on construction
sites — the highest incidence recorded since
1999. The percentage of construction accidents
has increased more than 12% between 2016
and 2017, representing of 28% of all work
fatalities in 2017. The The fatality rates of the
construction industry vs. all industries from years
1999 to 2017 are shown in Figure 1. It is also
noteworthy that the number of construction site
fatalities has recorded an upward trend since
2012. Additionally, the fatality rate per 100,000
workers of the construction industry was also
high — about three times the overall industrial
fatality rate. As shown in Figure 2, in 2017 about
15 site workers died for every 100,000 workers.
Poor site safety management, both in
managing the project and the OSH risks, has
been establised as one of the originating factors
of construction accidents by the Health and
Safety Executives (HSE), United Kingdom 1 . In
addition, other originating factors associated
with construction accidents are permanent work
design, construction processes, safety culture,
client requirements, economic climate and
1
2
education provisions (see Figure 3). According
to HSE’s hierarchy of influences in construction
accidents, these originating factors would further
trigger the shaping factors, namely workers, site
and material/equipment factors, and consequently
affect the immediate accident circumstances.
As the model proposed, a construction accident
often results from an interfacing failure between
workers, their workplace, and the equipment and
materials they used.
However, during accident investigations,
forensic investigators often intermix these
influences and factors as the contributing factors
of the accident. This is understandable as most
of the accidents are multi-causal, whereby a
combination of influences and factors generally
coincide to result in an accident, as shown by the
Swiss Cheese Model in Figure 4. For example,
Walton 2 identified seven factors that contributed
to a viaduct toppling during the installation of a
parapet wall on an MRT site that caused the death
of three workers. The contributing factors to the
accident as pointed out by Walton are given in
Table 1, along with relevant influences or factors
as proposed by the HSE model. It is also notable
that items 2) and 4) in Table 1 may have resulted
from the inadequacies of risk management.
Health and Safety Executive (HSE). 2003. Causal Factors in Construction Accidents. Research Report 156.
Walton, S. 2017. HSE Transformation in SSP KVMRT Project. In Proceedings of 8th Malaysian Construction Summit
“Redefining Profit – Value Creation through Quality and Safety”.
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