Keeping Solo Workers Safe—With New Tech Gear and Old-School Strategy

Over time, social isolation can be as bad for your health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, studies have shown. Being isolated on the job may lead to severe harm much more abruptly.

And, thanks to technological advances that support widespread use of robotics, the phenomenon is increasing.

The automated equipment that can boost profit and productivity in manufacturing facilities as well as improve employee safety by limiting exposure to dangerous conditions also leaves more workers doing their jobs by themselves, according to the National Safety Council.

As a result, they face “increased risk of exposure to workplace hazards due to lack of assistance and supervision and the limited means of communication” to seek help in an emergency, officials with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration say in a report.

While many of the estimated 53 million lone workers in the U.S., Canada and Europe face the same hazards as peers in comparable industries, their solitude heightens the likelihood of worse outcomes than people injured while working with colleagues, the organization says in a 2023 white paper.

Solo workers lack “the practical benefit of co-workers, health and safety professionals, or supervisors to help or support them in meaningful ways,” NIOSH and OSHA point out in their report.

Lethal Consequences in Emergencies

“For example, lone workers may have difficulty identifying the safest work practices when something unexpected happens that isn’t covered by a workplace policy,” the agencies explain. “Perhaps most importantly, especially for workers in high-hazard industries, working alone can delay or deny a robust response to a workplace emergency. Investigations of ‘unwitnessed’ fatalities, in which a worker did not report at the end of the shift or whose body was discovered by a coworker, tragically illustrate what can happen when no co-workers are present to assist with lifesaving actions.”

While neither OSHA nor the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health has formally defined lone work, the report describes it as a potentially hazardous working condition when an individual cannot be seen or heard by another worker and where assistance is not readily available.

One of their primary advantages is that they often use communication tools such as satellite links that go beyond the limitations of typical cellular technology.

That’s important since 93 percent of isolated workers find themselves outside of cellular coverage at least some of the time, according to a survey of 224 workers and supervisors by TracPlus and Ground Control, two providers of tracking and communication technology.

In Trouble, Outside of Signal Range

About 63 percent said they had encountered difficulty contacting someone because they couldn’t get connectivity, and 19 percent reported trouble getting help after an accident.

While injury rates are largely unknown, according to the National Safety Council, a survey of 478 companies showed that 68 percent had experienced an incident with a lone worker in the past three years, with 20 percent being “quite severe” or “very severe.”

Indiana utility NiSource, whose field workers are often in remote areas where they might be isolated from help, began distributing Blackline Safety’s G7 safety devices—which include fall and no-motion detectors, two-way voice and text messaging and GPS monitoring—a few years ago, according to a case study by the National Safety Council’s Work to Zero initiative.

In one case, an employee used the device to call for help after getting locked in a basement, the report says.

Another employee’s device detected high levels of carbon monoxide—an odorless, invisible but deadly gas—while he was eating lunch in a restaurant and enabled him to alert management before anyone was harmed.

What steps does your business take to keep isolated workers safe? Tell us in the comments below.