By its very nature, working at heights exposes operators to a risk of a fall that is reasonably likely to cause injury or death.

In determining the best solution, there will be situations where fall hazards can be eliminated completely or at least minimised by accounting for the needs and introducing systems specifications in the initial design phase of a project. This is in an ideal situation, but often we a confronted with projects and work locations where workers will need to be protected via other means as the risk of a fall could not be reduced or removed.

Removing or eliminating the hazard is considered the best method of protecting workers from falls, whilst applying a collective fall protection approach is often more practicable as far as instituting changes to existing structures. This means drawing solutions from the different tiers of the Hierarchy of Controls to determine how best to address the unique problems of the work needing to be carried out.