Upon approval, this plan sets the standards to be followed by the mine operator or a contractor in the slope and shaft sinking operation. On the day of the accident, a concrete pour was being made to form the shaft lining. The day shift began the concrete pour, and the evening shift completed the task.
Concrete is delivered into the shaft in a six-cubic yard concrete bucket. The bucket is filled with concrete at the top of the shaft. The bucket is attached to the hoist rope and is lowered down the shaft by the main construction hoist. The concrete is dispensed through an opening in the bottom of the concrete bucket.
A clamshell type gate is installed over the opening at the bottom of the bucket and controls the flow of concrete from the bucket. This clamshell gate can be opened and closed manually by a handle on the side of the bucket. It can also be operated remotely by use of a pneumatic valve and cylinder attached to the clamshell gate.
Attached to the bottom of the concrete bucket is a hopper with a flexible hose attached to it. The hopper gathers the concrete as it is released from the concrete bucket and funnels it down to the hose. The concrete flows by gravity through the hose.
The hose is approximately feet long. This flexible hose allows the concrete to be distributed to different areas around the shaft wall. At the time of the accident, the clamshell gate on the concrete bucket was being operated remotely.
A small chain was attached to the pneumatic valve and hung down from the concrete bucket to the work deck. An employee standing on the work deck operated the valve by pulling the chain. This in turn, caused the clamshell gate to open and close. Interviews with several employees indicated that this was not the preferred method of operating the gate.
The flow of concrete from the bucket into the hopper was difficult to control because the person operating the valve could not see how much concrete was being released into the hopper. In addition, the pneumatic cylinder did not always completely close the clamshell gate.
This often allowed an excessive amount of concrete to be released from the bucket into the hopper. The uneven flow of concrete through the flexible hose caused it to surge, which made controlling the hose difficult. Operating the clamshell gate manually was the preferred method mentioned by the persons interviewed. This method requires a person to stand on a platform attached to the concrete bucket and operate the handle attached through linkage to the gate.
This person can see the concrete as it is being released from the bucket into the hopper and have much greater control of the concrete into the flexible hose.
He was not aware of the accident involving Palmer that had occurred in the shaft some three and one half hours before his arrival. During the course of his inspection, CMI Wilson was informed of the accident. By that time, Palmer had been released from the hospital and was back at the mine. Palmer told CMI Wilson that the hose being used to pour the concrete shifted, causing him to lose his balance and fall backward, breaking a bone in his ankle.
For your convenience Section General Industry and Section Construction are reproduced here. Your Injury and Illness Prevention Program must be a written plan that includes procedures and is put into practice.
These elements are required:. Your commitment to safety and health shows in every decision you make and every action you take. Your employees will respond to that commitment. The person or persons with the authority and responsibility for your safety and health program must be identified and given management's full support.
You can demonstrate your commitment through your personal concern for employee safety and health and by the priority you place on these issues. If you want maximum production and quality, you need to control potential work-place hazards and correct hazardous conditions or practices as they occur or are recognized. You must commit yourself and your company by building an effective Injury and Illness Prevention Program and integrating it into your entire operation.
This commitment must be backed by strong organizational policies, procedures, incentives, and disciplinary actions as necessary to ensure employee compliance with safe and healthful work practices.
Your program must include a system for communicating with employees - in a form readily understandable by all affected employees - on matters relating to occupational safety and health, including provisions designed to encourage employees to inform the employer of hazards at the worksite without fear of reprisal.
While this section does not require employers to establish labor-management safety and health committees, it is an option you should consider. If you choose to do so, remember that employers who elect to use a labor-management safety and health committee to comply with the communication requirements are presumed to be in substantial compliance if the committee:. If your employees are not represented by an agreement with an organized labor union, and part of your employee population is unionized, the establishment of labor-management committees is considerably more complicated.
If you elect not to use labor-management safety and health committees, be prepared to formalize and document your required system for communicating with employees. Periodic inspections and procedures for correction and control provide a method of identifying existing or potential hazards in the workplace, and eliminating or controlling them.
Hazard control is the heart of an effective Injury and Illness Prevention Program. If hazards occur or recur, this reflects a breakdown in the hazard control system. The required hazard assessment survey of your establishment, when first developing your Injury and Illness Prevention Program, must be made by a qualified person.
This survey can provide the basis and guide for establishing your hazard assessment and control system. The survey produces knowledge of hazards that exist in the workplace, and conditions, equipment and procedures that could be potentially hazardous.
An effective hazard control system will identify: hazards that exist or develop in your workplace, how to correct those hazards, and steps you can take to prevent their recurrence. If you have an effective system for monitoring workplace conditions:. A primary tool you should be using in an effort to identify and recognize the areas responsible for accidents is a thorough and properly completed accident investigation.
It should be in writing and adequately identify the cause s of the accident or near-miss occurrence. Accident investigations should be conducted by trained individuals, and with the primary focus of understanding why the accident or near miss occurred and what actions can be taken to preclude recurrence.
In large organizations this responsibility may be assigned to the safety director. In smaller organizations the responsibility may lie directly with the supervisor responsible for the affected area or employee. Questions to ask in an accident investigation include:. Corrective action should be identified in terms of not only how it will prevent a recurrence of the accident or near miss, but also how it will improve the overall operation. The solution should be a means of achieving not only accident control, but also total operation control.
If you have a safety and health committee, its members should review investigations of all accidents and near-miss incidents to assist in recommending appropriate corrective actions to prevent a similar recurrence. Thorough investigation of all accidents and near misses will help you identify causes and needed corrections, and can help you determine why accidents occur, where they happen, and any accident trends.
Such information is critical to preventing and controlling hazards and potential accidents. Planning for safety and health is an important part of every business decision, including purchasing, engineering, changes in work processes, and planning for emergencies.
Your safety and health planning are effective when your workplace has:. Training is one of the most important elements of any Injury and Illness Prevention Program. Place an order on our website is very easy and will only take a few minutes of your time.
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Want to make sure writer's skills match your needs? National Center for Biotechnology Information , U. Journal List Sensors Basel v. Sensors Basel. Published online Aug Author information Article notes Copyright and License information Disclaimer. Received May 31; Accepted Aug This article has been cited by other articles in PMC.
Abstract In many countries, the number of elderly people has grown due to the increase in the life expectancy of the population, many of whom currently live alone and are prone to having accidents that they cannot report, especially if they are immobilized.
Keywords: Internet of Things, elderly, expert system, homecare, ambient sensors. Introduction Currently, in many countries, the number of elderly people is growing due to the increase in the life expectancy of the population. Open in a separate window. Figure 1. Fall Detection The studies that focus on this area can also be subdivided, with some of them focusing on the development of wearable systems or devices [ 18 , 19 , 20 ], while others use edge devices most commonly mobile phones for information processing [ 21 , 22 , 23 ].
Behavioral Monitoring Among the literature found in this area, we observed studies focused on monitoring daily routines, behavioral pattern detection, and anomaly detection, using motion sensor networks [ 33 , 34 ]. Reminders Some studies investigate the best way to provide reminders or advice that will benefit the older person—for example, advising them to drink water if the temperature increases [ 51 ], to take their medication [ 52 ], etc. Materials and Methods 2. Materials To describe in detail the materials used for the development of this system, it is necessary to have an overview of its structure.
Figure 2. Assistive Device for the Home This is a device developed to be placed in the home of the elderly person. Figure 3. Connections of the elements that make up the home assistance device.
Web Interface Users and their caregivers must be registered through a web interface; in addition, medication routines and scheduled medical appointments must be specified. Data Storage and Processing This module is responsible for the storing and processing of all user data, has the necessary services to extract and store the information from the database, and also performs the task of creating rules for the operation of the expert system, taking into account the information detected by users throughout the day this process is explained in more detail in Section 2.
Data Collection First, it was necessary to carry out an investigation on the sensors to be included for the detection of anomalies in the home environment, in order to cover the greatest number of home emergencies at a low monetary cost, ruling out all those that could be considered intrusive by the elderly person. Table 1 Sensors used in the device and their characteristics. Sensor Characteristics Temperature and humidity sensor Detects ambient temperature and humidity periodically Barometric pressure and temperature sensor Detects ambient temperature and atmospheric pressure periodically Photo sensor Periodically detects lighting level Gas sensor CH4, butane, propane Detects gas levels CH4, butane, and propane periodically and provides the binary state of gas presence in the coverage area event Motion sensor infrared Provides the binary state of motion presence in the coverage area event Fire sensor Provides the binary state of fire presence in the coverage area event Infrared receiver sensor for TV remote control Provides the binary state of infrared light emission from a remote control event Shock sensor Provides the binary state of presence of movement or direct hit to the device event.
User Interaction and Notifications In the first interaction with the user, it will be necessary to configure Internet access; a drop-down menu will appear, where the Wi-Fi network of the home can be selected.
Figure 4. Figure 5. Figure 6. Table 2 Rules of unusual behavior to alert the family member or caregiver of the dependent person.
It is always checked that the temperature does not decrease from the set minimum value. If this happens, an alert message is sent. It is checked all the time that the temperature does not exceed the maximum value set.
Gas presence Permanent The presence of gas is checked all the time; in case it occurs, an alert message is sent. Presence of fire Permanent The presence of fire is checked all the time: in case it occurs, an alert message is sent. Presence of movement in an unusual time range Modifiable If movement is detected in an unusual time range, an alert message is sent.
No presence of movement in the usual time range Modifiable If no motion is detected in a time range in which it should usually occur, an alert message is sent. Nighttime temperature is higher than daytime temperature Modifiable The system stores the highest temperature in a daily time range — If the current time is equal to or greater than the time at night when there is usually no user movement present, and the current temperature is higher than the stored temperature, an alert message is sent for heating on at bedtime.
Interaction with the TV remote control in an unusual time range Modifiable If the use of a TV remote control is detected within an unusual time range, an alert message is sent. It is checked within the time range under study that the light intensity does not decrease from the set minimum value. If this occurs, an alert message is sent. It is checked within the time range under study that the light intensity does not exceed the maximum value set.
Table 3 Meta-rules of unusual behavior to alert of possible emergency. Rule Type Characteristics Presence of movement and presence of interaction with the TV control Modifiable If movement and interaction with the TV control is detected within the same unusual time range, an alert message is sent indicating that the person is watching TV at an unusual time. Presence of movement and low light level Modifiable If motion is detected in a low-light environment within an unusual time range of movement, an alert message is sent.
Presence of fire and significant temperature increase Permanent If a fire is present and the temperature increases by a specified number of degrees within a time interval, an emergency message is sent. Control Test Control tests of each of the stages of the system have been carried out with a test user, checking the complete flow of the SecurHome system.
Results This section details the results obtained in the control test carried out throughout the study period.
Regarding the interaction with the TV remote control, the same set of rules described in the Rules and Sending Alerts section were considered also modifiable according to the user : Send an alert message if there is interaction with a remote control during unusual hours — ; Send an alert message if there is interaction with a remote control during unusual hours — Figure 7.
Measurements of Temperature The temperature analysis was carried out throughout the two weeks under study; there was no intentional alteration in the environment of the room where the device for the home was located.
Figure 8. Temperature behavior in the two weeks studied in the control test. Sending Alert Messages with Intentional Alteration of the Environment For the following experiment, three types of alteration were made to the environment of the room where the device for the home was placed. Figure 9. Table 4 Alert messages with intentional alteration of the environment. Presence of Fire Presence of Gas Range of Hours Number of Triggered Events Alert Message Sent Number of Triggered Events Alert Message Sent — 1 - 0 - — 0 - 3 1 — 9 - 0 - — 6 - 4 1 — 2 - 4 1 — 1 - 2 - — 1 - 2 1 — 0 - 2 1 — 0 - 3 1 — 0 - 2 1 — 0 - 2 1 — 0 - 2 - — 3 1 2 1.
Conclusions and Future Work An anomaly-monitoring, detection, and alert system based on the installation of the Internet of Things IoT has been successfully implemented. Author Contributions Conceptualization, R.
Institutional Review Board Statement Ethical review and approval were waived for this study, due to the tests were carried out by the research team. Informed Consent Statement Not applicable. Conflicts of Interest The authors declare no conflict of interest. References 1. Eurostat Ageing Europe. Kojima G. Is living alone a risk factor of frailty?
A systematic review and meta-analysis. Ageing Res. Association between living arrangements and depressive symptoms among older women and men in South Korea. Psychiatry Psychiatr. Djundeva M. Stahl S. Living alone and depression: The modifying role of the perceived neighborhood environment. Aging Ment. Decullier E. Health Aging. Almeida L. Prevalence of falls in elderly people: A population based study.
Gurley R. Persons found in their homes helpless or dead. Pimouguet C. Impact of living alone on institutionalization and mortality: A population-based longitudinal study. Public Health. Ibarra-Esquer J. Greco L. Pattern Recognit. Grosan C. Intelligent Systems. Intelligent Systems Reference Library. Rule-Based Expert Systems; pp. Stavropoulos T. Bakar U. Mukhopadhyay S. Springer International Publishing; Cham, Switzerland: Kraft D.
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