Data-Driven Investigation into Causes of Collapse in Scaffolds
Publication: Practice Periodical on Structural Design and Construction
Volume 22, Issue 2
Abstract
This work presents an investigation into the causes of collapse in scaffolds. The study was performed by identifying the prevalence of common scaffold design and construction attributes (such as those related to the geometry and construction of a scaffold or applied loads) during collapse and studying any correlations between these attributes and the number of scaffold collapses over several years. The data on scaffold collapse were gathered from those published by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Using these data, the causes of collapse were classified into several categories, and scaffold attributes prevalent in collapse within each category were examined. This classification was further refined into two main categories of collapses resulting from (1) improper design or (2) construction errors. The comparison of failure data for these two categories determined that the improper design of scaffolds causes approximately 50% more collapses than construction errors.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Practice Periodical on Structural Design and Construction
Volume 22 • Issue 2 • May 2017
Copyright
© 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jul 20, 2016
Accepted: Sep 29, 2016
Published online: Nov 9, 2016
Discussion open until: Apr 9, 2017
Published in print: May 1, 2017
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