Winter Safety: Preparing for Winter and Understanding the Risks

As winter approaches it's important to understand the additional safety risks that it brings.

Organisations are obliged to provide safe working conditions and, during winter, this means providing employees with access to regular hot drinks, frequent breaks, warm clothing and PPE.

There are a number of cold and winter-related accidents and diseases that can have serious implications on health in the workplace.

For this reason, we’ve put together this handy guide to break down the main risks of winter and how to prepare ahead of time:

Winter and associated risks

Low temperatures

As mentioned, employers have a duty to protect their staff from the cold. Guidelines set in place by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) suggest a minimum of 16°C or 13°C for indoor work if employees are doing physical work, however, there are no such parameters for working outdoors.

For work environments where heating is not always feasible, such as on construction sites or in large logistics centres (which may be open and exposed to adverse conditions), it’s essential to protect personnel by choosing the most appropriate workwear and PPE.

For example, warm winter clothing that provides waterproof and thermal protection against the rain, sleet or snow .

Frostbite and hypothermia are dangerous conditions that can occur when a person is exposed to extremely cold temperatures.

According to the WHO, the most common symptoms are:

- Respiratory: shortness of breath, wheezing, coughing.

- Cardiovascular: chest pain, arrhythmia, shortness of breath.

- Peripheral circulation: change in colour of fingers and toes, pain, numbness, tingling sensation.

- Musculoskeletal: pain, stiffness, swelling, restricted movement, paraesthesia, muscle weakness.

- Dermatological: itching, rashes, pale skin, erythema, oedema.

Extreme conditions

The HSE suggests that slips, trips and falls accounted for 33% of all non-fatal workplace accidents in 2020/2021.

It makes sense that this risk increases dramatically when workers are faced with conditions like wind, rain, snow, hail or ice.

To ensure safety, companies should:

- Keep car parks and pavements clear of snow and ice; this is especially important before workers arrive and after they leave at the end of their shift.

- Use salt, sand or other slip-preventing materials when necessary.

- Provide good lighting and clear markings of areas and lanes.

- Make any steps, ramps or changes in floor level clearly visible.

Reduced visibility

As we all know too well, shorter daylight hours make the workplace a darker and more dangerous place.

Fog, mist and haze can reduce visibility and lead to serious accidents at work, especially when working with vehicles and machinery outdoors.

Proper lighting, clear markings and signage can prevent slips, trips and falls and help improve poor visibility conditions.

Reflective and high-visibility clothing are extremely important as they help the wearer be seen in low lighting and adverse conditions.

Preparing for cold working conditions

To ensure workers can work safely in winter weather, the right training and preparation is essential:

The first step in protecting workers from winter temperatures is to carry out a thorough risk assessment. There are a number of factors to consider:

- Geographical location

- The sector, its occupational risks and hazards

- Duration of exposure to these hazards

Secondly, a PPE assessment must be carried out to ensure all the required needs from the identified risks are met. Additional workwear will likely be necessary.

This could include hi-vis workwear , jackets and coats , waterproof clothing , warm safety boots thermal gloves and so on.

Having the right PPE is vital, but you need to go further. The third step to preparing for winter is to identify employees' level of training and their understanding of the risks associated with winter.

Employees must be trained on these risks, they should know how to protect themselves and how to correctly use the PPE made available to them.

Do you need help choosing the right workwear and PPE for winter? Check out this blog

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