This year we have been engaged in Abu Dhabi City Municipality’s Heat Stress Awareness Campaign and participated in the Heat Stress Workshop in May 2013. We demonstrated how TWL-1S Heat Stress Detector can assist the site managers to comply with new regulation effectively and efficiently, and many participants invited us to their project sites for live demos.

Over 400 HSE officers and managers attended the workshop. In his speech, the Abu Dhabi Municipality EHS Inspection Team Leader, Mr. Ibrahim Khalid, emphasized that mitigating practice, such as proper hydration, supplement of electrolytes and frequent short rests, must be taken to prevent serious heat illness at worksites with high heat conditions.

Mr. Darren Joubert from Health Authority Abu Dhabi elaborated the importance of heat stress management and the law that companies should follow, particularly the Code of Practice (EHS RI-CoP 11.0 – Safety in the Heat) published by Abu Dhabi EHSMS in April 2013. In the code of practice, it states “Employers that have employees working in high temperature environments shall develop a worksite specific heat stress program that includes a process for assessing environmental conditions utilizing the Thermal Work Limit (TWL) to determine work/rest breaks and water consumption requirements for employees.”

Mr. Brent Choate from ODEBRECHT shared his practical experience of heat stress management in the field, provided a thumb of rule to quickly check the symptoms of dehydration and heat illness and urged the audience to implement measures that are required by the new regulation.