Content Executive Summary 2 Introduction 2 Analysis of Lift incidents Root Cause of Incidents 2 Hazards in the HDB lift environment 3 Main Plant, Chemical Hazards, Biological Hazards 3 Assessment of Risks Three Highest-risk Plant Hazards 4 Two Highest-risk Chemical Hazards 5 One Highest-risk biological Hazard 5 Control Measures Hierarchy of Risk Control 6 Recommended Control Measures 6 ALARP Principle 7 Risk Reassessment RPN of Plant, Chemical, Biological Hazards 8 Lift Maintenance-purchasing Policy Pre-purchase 9 Post-purchase 9 Conclusion 10 Appendices 13 1
Executive Summary (123 words) Lift accidents have been occurring more frequently, causing harm to civilians and the lift technicians. This report will reveal the root causes that are mostly in relation to the lift systems itself. From there, the risk assessment was done showing that there were mainly medium to high risk assessment numbers. The hierarchy of controls such as the administrative controls, engineering controls, and personal protective equipment will be used to derive control measures that can be used for the lift technicians. After implementation of the recommended control measures, a risk reassessment will be conducted to check whether the risk numbers have reduced by a tier. Lastly, the pre-purchasing and post-purchasing for the lift maintenance will be discussed and revealing its importance in the industry. Introduction The main aim of this report is to assess the risks imposed for HDB lift technicians who service the lifts in Singapore's older high-rise HDB apartment buildings from further incidents. However, before diving into the risk assessment report itself, this paper will also be addressing the root causes, key hazards, controls and risks, and appropriate measures to mitigate and reduce the risks in compliance with regulations lifts in Singapore's older high-rise HDB apartment buildings from further incidents. From there, the report will also recommend a brief lift maintenance-purchasing policy for future purchases. The necessary theories, theoretical frameworks, and models, particularly those learnt in Work, Health, Safety and Wellbeing will be applied. Analysis of Lift Incidents In this portion of the report, the main causes of the older high-rise HDB apartment buildings incidents and fatalities will be looked over. It will be broken down into three subcomponents, its root causes, hazards in the environment of the HDB lifts, and risk assessment. 1. Root Cause(s) of Incidents Based on the articles provided via the background snapshot, there are a few main causes. In the case of the 20-year-old who died from serious burnt injuries due to the lift fire (Kwee 2021), it was mainly caused by his Personal Mobility Device (PMD). His PMD was illegally modified 2
and breached the safety regulations set by the government. His fatality had no relations to the lift being faulty. In the other cases in the background snapshot, such as the ones by Kok (2021), Ng & Yeo (2015), Liu (2019), Tan (2018), Hun (n.d), Voltaire (2017), and Lim (2016), it was concluded at the end of the articles that the root causes were due to the faulty lift carriage, its systems, and lack of proper