As part of my on-the-job training, I was assigned to monitor the construction activities of the project being undertaken. Since it was the construction of our office building, I was required to submit a detailed activity report.
When I arrived at the site, the construction was still on its foundation stage but work was already in full throttle. There were actually four heavy equipment on the ground working simultaneously - the dozer, the grader, the backhoe and the payloader. The din of the equipment working together made normal conversation impossible, but equipment operators were splendidly doing the job assigned to them.
After some time, I noticed that the construction supervisor, the foreman and the equipment operator, do their on-site instructions through the use of
custom signal flags.
For example, when the superintendent raised a flag, the dozer immediately backed off, the payloader advances in position and awaits the entry of large dump trucks to clear the area of debris. And as another flag was raised, the large dump trucks left the area.
Or there was a time when a flag was raised and the dozer and backhoe worked hand in hand to dig deeper and when another flag was raised, the grader entered the picture and leveled off the ground.
So, it came to my understanding that even if field personnel had radios on, they are still totally dependent on construction flags or markers to relay their instructions to field operators, simply because conversation was at a very limited range considering the noise generated by the equipment.
I was still at the foundation stage of the work, so expect additional use of the construction marker as work progresses up.
by:
The Flagman
