Particularly hazardous work

Particularly hazardous work is work for which the risk of accidents is greater than for other types of work, due to its specific nature, materials used or local working conditions.

Lists of types of particularly hazardous work

The types of particularly hazardous work are specified:

• in the Regulation on the general rules of occupational health and safety (Chapter 6 ‘Particularly hazardous work’). These are:
  • construction, demolition, renovation and assembly work performed without shutting down an establishment or a part of it (Sections 82 to 84 of the Regulation);
  • work in containers, sewers, inside technical devices and other dangerous enclosed spaces (Sections 85 to 90 of the Regulation);
  • work involving hazardous materials (Sections 91 to 104 of the Regulation);
  • work at heights (Sections 105 to 110 of the Regulation);
• in other provisions, including sectoral provisions on occupational health and safety;
• in operating manuals for devices and installations;
• by employers at their discretion.

Employers must determine the form of the lists of types of particularly hazardous work performed at establishments and update these lists.

Obligations of employers

Employers must determine detailed occupational health and safety requirements for the performance of particularly hazardous work and ensure:

• direct supervision over the work by designated persons – supervisors must be present at all times during the performance of the hazardous work (it cannot be performed if the supervisors are absent, even temporarily);
• organisational and technical safeguard measures appropriate for the type of work performed: safety measures for workers, collective protective equipment (for example, railings, automatic ventilation or dedusting), personal protective equipment (breathing apparatus, retractable type fall arresters), marking of danger zones etc.
• instructions for workers, covering, inter alia:
  • the separation of duties between individual workers;
  • the order in which tasks are to be performed;
  • occupational health and safety requirements for individual operations;
• access to places where the particularly hazardous work is performed only for authorised persons who have received appropriate instructions.

In order to fulfil these obligations:

• employers and persons managing workers may determine in writing detailed occupational health and safety conditions for the work performed, including the way in which duties are to be separated between individual workers;
• work may be undertaken and performed only on the basis of written permits, issued in a manner determined by employers;
• workers may be informed about the properties of the materials, semi-finished products and finished products used and about the ways of using them safely;
• the procedure to be followed in emergencies may be presented.