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Injuries to air force personnel associated with lifting, handling, and carrying objects
Philip A Kemp1, Bruce R Burnham, G Bruce Copley
1HQ AFSC/SEPR, Kirtland AFB, New Mexico, USA.
American Journal of Preventive Medicine
|February 2, 2010
Summary
U.S. Air Force (USAF) personnel frequently sustain lost-workday injuries from lifting, handling, and carrying objects, with back injuries being most common. Aircraft components cause a significant portion of these lift-handle-carry injuries, necessitating targeted safety countermeasures.
Area of Science:
- Occupational Safety and Health
- Ergonomics
- Injury Prevention
Background:
- U.S. Air Force (USAF) active duty and civilian populations report numerous lost-workday injuries from manual material handling tasks.
- Back injuries are the most prevalent type of injury associated with lifting, handling, and carrying objects.
Purpose of the Study:
- To characterize the specific hazard scenarios contributing to lift-handle-carry injuries within the USAF.
- To inform the development and implementation of targeted, effective injury prevention strategies.
Main Methods:
- Analysis of USAF safety reports from 1993-2002, focusing on injuries resulting in at least one lost workday.
- Inclusion of 4085 lost-workday injuries and 24,940 lost workdays.
- Identification and aggregation of objects associated with these injuries to determine common causes.
Main Results:
- Twelve distinct object categories were identified as primary sources of lift-handle-carry injuries.
- Commonly implicated objects include aircraft components, boxes, and furniture.
- Lifting aircraft components alone accounted for 33% of all identified lift-handle-carry injuries.
Conclusions:
- Safety report data effectively identifies high-risk objects and tasks for manual material handling injuries.
- Specific countermeasures are recommended to address prevalent injury causes, particularly for aircraft maintenance personnel lifting aircraft components.
- Further evaluation studies are warranted to assess the efficacy of implemented countermeasures.
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