Lighting Jobs: Easy Work or Easy Death

Work on lights and lighting circuits continues to be a serious hazard that is injuring and killing workers. Workers all too often choose to work on or near energized circuits without taking the necessary steps to create an electrically safe work condition or properly protect themselves from the hazards. Supervisors and managers often consider lighting work to be very easy or basic and, thus, fail to provide the proper instruction and guidance to their electrical workers. This paper sheds light on the issues with work practice solutions as well as design and installation solutions. The review will include the several code changes in recent years intended to design out the hazards. Guidance is provided to help recognize earlier installations or non-compliant installations and how to correct them with a particular discussion on energized neutral issues. The authors also provide a review of (#) fatalities and injuries while performing work on lighting to reinforce the seriousness of the issue.