Promoting occupational health and safety through intensive care for technical equipment as well as the people who handle this equipment represents the central theme of the Safety of Technical Equipment conference. This year’s event can be described as a jubilee, as ten years have passed since Technická inšpekcia, a.s. began organizing this professional event for specialists dealing with the safety of technical equipment. Over these years, the conference has constantly evolved, as evidenced not only by a professional program interesting to participants focused on all types of technical equipment, but primarily by the fact that a small expert forum has gradually become a conference that is today considered a significant source of information in the field of occupational health and safety in the Slovak Republic.
The importance of the conference and its benefit for increasing the level of occupational health and safety protection at the national level was confirmed by the patronage of JUDr. Ján Richter, Minister of Labor, Social Affairs and Family of the Slovak Republic. The Minister appreciated the contribution of the conference, as he considers it a meeting of experts and specialists involved in the issues of technical equipment safety for the purpose of raising awareness and searching for effective risk management tools, new trends in prevention, and best practice experiences.
Interest in current topics from the specific field of technical safety attracted 187 representatives of the professional public representing 66 different companies from all over the Slovak Republic to the conference this year. Participants included not only operators of technical equipment, manufacturers of technical equipment, inspection technicians, safety technicians, managers of main mechanics departments, and service companies, but also managers responsible for the safety of technical equipment, owners of work equipment, and labor inspectors supervising compliance with legal regulations in this area.
The jubilee tenth year of the Safety of Technical Equipment 2018 conference, which was held on 25. and April 26, 2018, traditionally at the Hotel Sitno in Vyhne, was opened with a ceremonial speech by Ing. Dušan Perniš, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Technická inšpekcia, a.s. In his speech, he emphasized that he is pleased by the constantly growing number of conference participants, which testifies to the ongoing interest of the professional public in actively participating in improving the state of technical equipment safety, as well as strengthening the alignment between the economic interests of business entities and the protection of people in their working lives. His words were followed by information on the current activities and priorities of the National Labor Inspectorate by the Deputy Director General, Mgr. Jaroslav Pástor.
It is already a tradition that Technická inšpekcia, a.s., as the professional and organizational guarantor, provides space at the conference for renowned lecturers. During the tenth year of the conference, which was divided into two days due to the interdisciplinary nature of technical safety (three lecture blocks on the first day and two lecture blocks on the second day), 14 recognized experts from various fields of technical equipment safety presented current information as well as their knowledge and experience.
The first lecture of the opening day of the conference was presented by a long-time expert, JUDr. Rudolf Kubica, Chief Labor Inspector from the Žilina Labor Inspectorate. In his contribution on the topic The Course of Accidents Caused by Technical Equipment, he presented to the conference participants in a visual way (detailed photographs) several accidents investigated by the labor inspection, highlighting the main shortcomings and problems in the operation of technical equipment. Based on experience from inspection activities, he identified the main problems as primarily a low level of care for technical equipment (insufficient inspection activity, inconsistent maintenance and repair) and ignorance of the operator’s or attendant’s duties, or in worse cases, conscious ignorance of these duties.
One of the interesting lectures of the first day of the conference was the lecture titled Drones and their use in the inspection of technical equipment in operation, presented by Ing. Ondrej Sluka representing the company UAVONIC, s.r.o. The aim of his lecture was to provide participants with a different perspective on drones, so they are not perceived only as devices used for sports or entertainment. Currently, there is a gradual development in the use of drones for building inspections (thermal and visual), anchoring and securing elements, cranes, machinery and conveyor equipment (drilling platforms, conveyors), vertical and suspended structures (chimneys, bridges), or underground pipelines (heating pipes, gas pipelines).
The final block of lectures on the first day of the conference belonged to the representatives of the organizer, Technická inšpekcia, a.s., namely Ing. Richard Balluch and Ing. Róbert Paška. The first-mentioned lecturer spoke about the issue of the safety of elevators as lifting equipment, which are the most widely used means of transporting people in buildings worldwide, from several perspectives. In his lecture, he focused not only on the safety of existing elevators (modernization and reconstruction) but also on the safety and reliability of new elevators, as despite the constant tightening of requirements and improvement of the current state of science and technology, the number of accidents on elevators is increasing, even in developed Western countries. The safety of machinery in operation was the topic of the lecture that significantly interested the conference participants, as Ing. Róbert Paška presented in an engaging way the reasons why it pays to own and operate safe machinery and what the most frequently identified shortcomings are when verifying the safety of machinery in operation.
The second day of the conference was opened by Ing. Marián Bartoš, representing the conference co-organizer, the Slovak Welding Society. In his lecture on the topic New Trends in Increasing the Safety of Transmission Routes, he shared long-term experience and perhaps hidden knowledge from the wider public about new approaches to the construction and renewal of energy transmission routes using helicopter support technologies, without devastating effects on the landscape. At the same time, he indicated the technical trend leading to an increase in the resilience of transmission routes and cited several specific transmission route failures caused by weather fluctuations not only abroad but also in the Slovak Republic.
Safety Management of Technical Equipment in Operation was the title of the lecture given by Ing. Martin Demčák, PhD. from Slovnaft, a.s. During the presentation of the standard safety management system and the process safety management system, he pointed out the important fact that even for a large company such as Slovnaft, a.s., the greatest value is the employees and the equipment they work on or operate. Since a serious failure of the human factor or equipment can threaten the business, and even the very existence of the company, operational safety represents the highest value.
The last lecture that closed the conference program was Causes of Technical Equipment Accidents. A long-time and popular lecturer among conference participants, Col. Ing. Pavel Hrdý, who works at the Institute of Forensic Science of the Police Force of the Slovak Republic, shared interesting information in his typical and attractive way about real technical equipment accidents and also about the investigative methods used to determine their causes.
The jubilee tenth year of the Safety of Technical Equipment 2018 conference continued the tradition of its predecessors. The high professional level of the program, ensured by renowned lecturers and experts, allowed conference participants to leave for home with a wealth of useful information. Since this is information that most conference participants will apply in their further professional lives, we believe that the conference actively participates in increasing the level of technical safety in the Slovak Republic. The successful course of the conference would not have been possible to ensure without the co-organizer, the Slovak Welding Society, conference partners SEPS, a.s., SPP – distribúcia, a.s., Nafta, a.s., Veolia Energia Slovensko, a.s., Eustream, a.s., as well as media partners Education, s.r.o., Bezpečná práca, ATPJournal, Strojárstvo/Strojírenství, and Bezpečnosť práce v praxi.
We thank all partners for their support, participants for their attendance at the conference
and we look forward to meeting you at the
11th year of the conference.
Related pages: BTZ Conferences, Education.