Vol 9, No. 1, January 2008

 Contents

 

THOUGHTS & QUOTES

“… to teach is to touch the future!”

It is time once again for our annual "Ag Education Teacher’s Day” where we present safety resources to the students going out in a few weeks to begin their student teaching assignments. This is a fun group to work with as they are eagerly looking for teaching materials and ideas. This has led to the development of the Ag Teacher's Resource Kit. The Kit has now become a standard part of a UF agricultural education course, “Special Methods in Teaching Agriculture.” The kit is available on-line.

Students are presented with the materials assembled in a binder. A 2-hour block of time is allocated during which the contents are described and reviewed. Recommendations and examples are discussed for how the materials can be used in the classroom. Students also receive their own scale-model tractor overturn demonstration ramp (for use with the Mr. Good Egg ROPS demo) and various videos that have been made available.

The resources listed are available for download from the Web. Use the links to make your own "Safety Resource Kit" notebook. Students have noted that it is very useful to have these items assembled in one place. The materials can readily be adapted for use in any program and used to meet requirements for core competencies.

Resources are listed with a brief annotation about their contents. In order to make it easier to assemble a kit, links are also provided for a cover and an update/new materials page.

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Burn Awareness Week Feb 3-9

Burn prevention is a key endeavor of Shriners Hospitals for Children, which is why this hospital system began its Burn Awareness campaigns more than 25 years ago. Held the first full week in February, Burn Awareness Week is recognized by the National Health and Information Center, Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The theme for Burn Awareness 2008 is Preventing Gasoline Burns. The Shriners Hospitals for Children have treated more than 800 children since 2002 for acute burn injuries resulting from ignition of highly flammable materials such as gasoline. Children of ages 13 and older are in the highest risk group for gasoline and other flammable substances.

During Burn Awareness Week 2008, February 3-9, Shriners Hospitals will concentrate on how to prevent gasoline burn injuries and promote the safe use and storage of gasoline.

Most gasoline injuries are avoidable through proper use and storage of gasoline. By visiting the Shirners Hospital Burn Awareness Web site, you can join the mission to prevent burn injuries. Information includes:

  • Tips for Parents and Caregivers
  • Tips for 'Tweens and Teens
  • Burn Treatment

The Shriners Hospital site includes information about preventing other kinds of burns as well. Did you know that young children can receive friction burns by playing around treadmills?

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Safe Transport of Livestock

A recent incident in Illinois that involved a double-decker livestock transport truck crammed with 59 draft horses has increased awareness about safety issues related to hauling animals. [Details on this horrific incident and the dramatic work done by rescuers.]

Forty-one of the horses have survived and are in the process of being provided with new homes. A report was recently released by Jennifer Woods, a researcher in Canada who studied livestock trucking incidents. Her report summarized that of the 415 commercial livestock truck incidents:

  • 85% were attributed to driver error
  • 80% were single vehicle
  • 59% occurred in the early morning hours between midnight and 9:00 a.m.
  • 56% were cattle trucks
  • 27% were pig trucks
  • 11% were poultry trucks
  • 1% were weather condition related

“The majority involved rollovers to the right; this, along with the early morning hours of occurrence, suggests that driver fatigue played a role in the cause,” says Jennifer Woods, a livestock consultant. “Driver fatigue is a major issue in all trucking sectors, but unlike other sectors, livestock truckers are dealing with live loads that are constantly ‘moving’ and ‘shifting’ and that leaves less room for driver error.”

For more information:

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New Hearing Loss Prevention Publications

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Kubota Tractor Safety Materials

Kubota Tractor Safety materials are readily available on-line. These are good reminders and safety tips for experienced tractor operators as well as the hobby farmer who may have limited previous ag experience. Included is their popular publication, “The Ten Commandments of Tractor Safety.”

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Neighborhood Safety Network

The CPSC needs your help to keep people safe in and around the home. They have developed the Neighborhood Safety Network Safety Tool Kit to help consumers and communities promote safety and health.

There is a variety of publications, posters, checklists, and tools that can be downloaded for free and used to create a safety program in your neighborhood. Learn how to Design a Safety Program to share this lifesaving information with friends, family and anyone who may need access to safety information.

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Childhood Agricultural Safety Network

The Childhood Agricultural Safety Network now has 3 poster campaigns, including:

  • It’s Easier to Bury a Tradition than a Child
  • The Tractor is Not the Place to Spend Quality Time
  • A 75-Pound Child Has No Chance Against Your 10,000 Pound Tractor

Go to www.childagsafety.org for updated safety posters, PSA’s, and other materials.

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Talking Smoke Detectors

Researchers are finding that children may continue to sleep during a regular smoke alarm going off. However, they found that children responded well to waking up to hearing a voice say ‘get up’ or something similar. There are now smoke alarms that allow parents to record a message to awaken the children. Also, it was found that hearing a familiar voice helped children remain calmer. See http://rediexit.ipower.com/talking-smoke-alarms.html for more information.

The U.S. Fire Administration has information about fire risks for the deaf and hard of hearing. Included are the types of smoke detectors that are available for the hearing impaired.

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Updated OSHA Publication Page

OSHA has updated their Publications Web Page to be more refined and user-friendly. The page provides users with five different ways to search for products: by publication number; keyword; alphabetically; industry/topic; and by type of publication. OSHA aims for this page to serve as the comprehensive resource for safety and health products and information.

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The National Center for Farmworker Health

The NCFH on-line library contains thousands of patient education materials and research articles. NCFH has created a series of monthly information alerts which provide a review of a specific health topic, available information resources, related patient education materials and links to other sources of information. The topics selected were identified through needs assessments conducted of Community and Migrant Health Center Staff, other NCFH programs, and national health observances. The monthly topics are at: http://www.ncfh.org/00_monthlymenu.php.

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SAFETY NEWS & NOTES is an e-mail newsletter prepared by Carol J. Lehtola, Extension Agricultural Safety Specialist and team leader for the Prevention and Preparedness: Agricultural Safety & Disaster Management program. Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, UF/IFAS. If you have safety- or disaster-related questions or ideas that you would like to share with other agents, please contact Dr. Lehtola. If you know someone interested in receiving this newsletter, we will gladly add them to the e-mail list. Past issues of Safety News & Notes are archived on the Florida AgSafe Web site.