• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.91-98
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• 2022

Since cranes are a kind of complex human-machine systems, it is almost impossible to completely secure safety with current technologies. Therefore, managerial interventions to prevent human errors are needed for safely operating a crane. The Occupational Safety and Health law states that cabin-type crane operators should have crane drivers' licence and crane-related operators (e.g., pendent-type crane operators, slinging workers) should take a special safety training. However, statistics on industrial accidents showed that fatalities due to crane accidents (185 accidents occurred during 2013~2017) were the highest among hazardous machinery and equipment. To effectively control the crane-related accidents, voices of crane workers need to be analyzed to investigate the current status. This study surveyed perceived causes of crane accidents and status of special safety training for crane workers of 387. The survey revealed that 24.3% of the respondents experienced crane accidents and 31.4% eye-witnessed crane accidents. 79% of the respondents pointed human errors such as improper crane operation and improper slinging as the first cause. Lastly, only 16.7% of the respondents took a professional special safety training; but the rest took lecture-based or incomplete education. The findings of the present study can be applied to improve crane-related policies and special safety training systems.

• International Journal of Internet, Broadcasting and Communication
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.85-96
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• 2023

The number of traffic accidents caused by wet or icy road surface conditions is on the rise every year. Car crashes in such bad road conditions can increase fatalities and serious injuries. Historical data (from the year 2016 to the year 2020) on weather-related traffic accidents show that the fatality rates are fairly high in Korea. This requires accurate prediction and identification of hazardous road conditions. In this study, a forecasting model is developed to predict the chances of traffic accidents that can occur on roads affected by weather and road surface conditions. Multiple deep learning algorithms taking into account AlexNet and 2D-CNN are employed. Data on orthophoto images, automatic weather systems, automated synoptic observing systems, and road surfaces are used for training and testing purposes. The orthophotos images are pre-processed before using them as input data for the modeling process. The procedure involves image segmentation techniques as well as the Z-Curve index. Results indicate that there is an acceptable performance of prediction such as 65% for dry, 46% for moist, and 33% for wet road conditions. The overall accuracy of the model is 53%. The findings of the study may contribute to developing comprehensive measures for enhancing road safety.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Clinical Toxicology
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.82-85
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• 2022

Traditionally, most cases of nicotine poisoning have been due to ingestion of nicotine pesticides. However, the increasing use of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) has resulted in both intentional and unintentional exposure to concentrated liquid nicotine or "e-liquid" leading to an increase in nicotine poisoning cases. However, fatalities following the ingestion of the e-liquid are extremely rare. We report a rare case of cardiac arrest and severe encephalopathy following the intentional ingestion of e-liquid. We present the case of a 20-year-old woman who intentionally ingested liquid nicotine intended for e-cigarette use. She was found in asystole and experienced a return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC) after undergoing approximately 46 mins of cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Her plasma nicotine levels were >500 ng/ml. Despite aggressive supportive care, she was found to have encephalopathy consistent with severe anoxic brain injury on magnetic resonance imaging. In recent times, there have been some reports of deaths following liquid nicotine ingestion. Our case illustrates the potential for fatal nicotine toxicity from ingestion of e-cigarettes.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2022.06a
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• pp.721-727
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• 2022

Construction safety remains an ongoing concern, and project managers have been increasingly forced to cope with myriad uncertainties related to human operations on construction sites and the lack of a skilled workforce in hazardous circumstances. Various construction fatality monitoring systems have been widely proposed as alternatives to overcome these difficulties and to improve safety management performance. In this study, we propose an intelligent, automatic control system that can proactively protect workers using both the analysis of big data of past safety accidents, as well as the real-time detection of worker non-compliance in using personal protective equipment (PPE) on a construction site. These data are obtained using computer vision technology and data analytics, which are integrated and reinforced by lessons learned from the analysis of big data of safety accidents that occurred in the last 10 years. The system offers data-informed recommendations for high-risk workers, and proactively eliminates the possibility of safety accidents. As an illustrative case, we selected a pilot project and applied the proposed system to workers in uncontrolled environments. Decreases in workers PPE non-compliance rates, improvements in variable compliance rates, reductions in severe fatalities through guidelines that are customized according to the worker, and accelerations in safety performance achievements are expected.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2022.06a
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• pp.508-515
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• 2022

Construction safety education will continue to attract the interests of construction educators, researchers, and industry professionals due to its immense influence on accident reduction and prevention. A well-educated workforce with a thorough understanding of safety requirements and procedures is needed to develop and apply effective safety and health programs as well as devise strategic means of preventing injuries, illnesses, and fatalities on construction projects. The objective of this research is to evaluate construction safety education in the curriculum of construction programs in the United States. An analysis of construction safety courses across accredited construction programs in the U.S. is conducted to synthesize important details and common themes. A nationwide characterization of the safety courses presented followed by an assessment selected a few programs as a pilot study. Critical elements of the courses such as course titles, course year, credit hours, topics covered, and alignment with professional certification or outreach training courses are characterized. Findings from the study reveal the similarities and variations that exist among safety courses taught in different construction programs in the U.S. These findings could result from several influencing factors, which could be the subject of further investigations geared toward improving safety education in construction programs.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.155-165
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• 2023

Hurricane Katrina swept New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, in 2005, causing more than 1,000 fatalities and severe damage to the flood protection system. Recovery activities are complete, however, clarifying failure mechanisms and devising resilient and cost-effective retrofitting techniques for the flood protection system are still of utmost importance to enhance the general structural integrity of water retaining structures. This study presents extensive centrifuge test results to find various failure mechanisms and effective retrofitting techniques for a levee system. The result confirmed the rotational failure and translational failure mechanisms for the London Ave. Canal levee and 17^th St. Canal levee, respectively. In addition, it found that the floodwalls with fresh waterstop in their joints perform better than those with old/weathered waterstop by decreasing pore water pressure build-up in the levee. Structural caps placed on the top of the joints between I-walls could also prevent local failure by spreading the load to surrounding walls. At the same time, the self-sealing bentonite-sand mixture installed along the riverside of floodwalls could mitigate the failure of floodwalls by blocking the infiltration of seepage water into the gap formed between levee soils and floodwalls.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.124-130
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• 2023

The increase in the number of fatal electric accidents over the years has escalated the demand for specialized forensic engineers to determine their relevant technical causes. Likewise, the complexities associated with identifying the causes of electrocution accidents have prompted the General Department of Forensic Science and Criminology at Dubai Police to adopt a new methodology to diagnose electrocution accidents, consisting of an approach that involves medico-legal examination, electrical diagnosis of the evidence, and trace evidence analysis. This paper will discuss the application of the adopted method in further detail by unfolding two case reports. The first report outlines a case in which a worker got electrocuted at a construction site while attempting to turn on a lamp. The second case report involves the death of a technician in a workshop after trying to disconnect a washing machine from its plug. The methodology was utilized during the investigation of both cases, which were attended by the appointed forensic engineers and showed promising results.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aviation and Aeronautics
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.18-24
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• 2023

According to the results of a survey by Boeing, LOC-I (Loss of Control in Flight) was the highest in the number of deaths by fatality accident category in the past 10 years from 2012 to 2021, and the number of deaths worldwide due to LOC-I accidents was 757. It turned out to be the biggest cause of aircraft fatalities, with a figure close to twice the sum of UNK (Unknown or Undetermined), which is the 2nd place, and CFIT (Controlled Flight Into or Toward Terrain), which is the 3rd place. This study set six scenarios related to spatial disorientation that may occur during sensory-dependent flight targeting student pilots and instructor pilots at domestic designated specialized educational institutions using flight simulation training equipment, and in each scenario, the pilot's. The need for SDRT (Spatial Disorientation Recovery Training) is verified by analyzing the flight experience and recovery ability by qualification, and SDRT is repeatedly performed to verify and present the training cycle and time.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Building Construction
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.81-92
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• 2023

According to the 2020 industrial accident reports of the Ministry of Employment and Labor, the number of fatal accidents in the construction industry over the past 5 years has been higher than in other industries. Of these more than 50% of fatal accidents are initially caused by fall accidents. The central government is intensively managing falling/jamming protection device and the use of personal protective equipment to eradicate the inappropriate factors disrupting safety at construction sites. In addition, although efforts have been made to prevent safety accidents with the proposal of the Special Act on Construction Safety, fatalities on construction sites are constantly occurring. Therefore, this study developed a model that automatically detects the wearing state of the worker's safety helmet and belt using computer vision technology. In considerations of conditions occurring at construction sites, we suggest an optimization method, which has been verified in terms of the accuracy and operation speed of the proposed model. As a result, it is possible to improve the efficiency of inspection and patrol by construction site managers, which is expected to contribute to reinforcing competency of safety management.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2022.06a
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• pp.1209-1216
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• 2022

The majority of construction site incidents occur due to a lack of hazard awareness among workers on job sites. This lack of awareness is despite mandatory construction safety training, typically in the form of written content (safety manuals) or of images depicting hazards. To reduce job-site injuries and fatalities, general contractors have started adopting Virtual Reality (VR) to impart safety training to job site personnel. VR safety training can take the form of an immersive simulation comprising potential safety hazards intentionally embedded into a virtual job site; users are required to identify these hazards within a specified time frame with the expectation that they will be more adept at recognizing hazards on an actual job-site, resulting in fewer accidents. This research study seeks to identify the actual impacts of VR on construction safety awareness among participants. The research addresses the following question: Does VR improve hazard recognition awareness? The primary objective is to evaluate participants' performance of past construction safety awareness against present construction safety awareness after receiving VR training. Participants were asked to complete a multiple-choice Qualtrics™ questionnaire. The results of the study showed a statistically significant knowledge gain advantage with respect to hazard recognition and construction safety awareness with the use of interactive, immersive VR over a more conventional and passive safety training method.