5.2 Who is who: rigger, signal person, operator, competent person

1 Competent person

1926.32(f): one who is capable of identifying existing and predictable hazards in the surroundings or working conditions which are unsanitary, hazardous or dangerous to employees, and who has authorization to take prompt corrective measures to eliminate them.

Two halves, and the second is the one that gets dropped. In rigging, the competent person appears in three places:

• The daily sling inspection — 1910.184(d) and 1926.251(a)(6), by a competent person designated by the employer.
• The thorough periodic inspection of chain slings — 1910.184(e)(3)(iii).
• Traveling with a load — 1926.1417(u)(2)(i): a competent person supervises the operation and determines whether rated capacity must be reduced, plus load position, boom location, ground support, travel route, overhead obstructions and speed of movement.

If the person doing your daily inspection has to ask permission before pulling a sling, the role is not filled, whatever the org chart says.

2 Qualified person, and qualified rigger

1926.1401 defines a qualified person as one who, by possession of a recognized degree or professional standing, or by extensive knowledge, training and experience, has successfully demonstrated the ability to solve or resolve problems relating to the subject matter, the work or the project. And then, in one line: "Qualified rigger is a rigger who meets the criteria for a qualified person."

Two situations in the cranes and derricks standard require one:

1. 1
   1926.1404(r)(1) — when rigging is used for assembly or disassembly of the equipment, the rigging work must be done by a qualified rigger.
2. 2
   1926.1425(c)(3) — when employees are hooking, unhooking or guiding the load, or making the initial connection of a load to a component or structure, and are within the fall zone, the materials must be rigged by a qualified rigger.

Read what those have in common: both are moments when people are close to a suspended load. The standard does not require a qualified rigger for every lift; it requires one where the consequences of bad rigging land on a person rather than on the ground.

Note also what a qualified rigger is not. It is not a card, and no federal rule requires third-party assessment. It is a determination the employer makes about a named individual for the kind of work in front of them. Someone can be a qualified rigger for one type of load and not for another.

3 Signal person

1926.1419(a) says when one has to exist: the point of operation — meaning the load travel or the area at or near load placement — is not in full view of the operator; or the equipment is traveling and the view in the direction of travel is obstructed; or site-specific safety concerns lead either the operator or the person handling the load to determine that one is necessary.

That third trigger is worth pausing on. It gives the person handling the load the ability to require a signal person, independently of what anyone else thinks. It is one of the few places in the standard where the decision is explicitly not the supervisor's.

1926.1428 sets out how a signal person is qualified, and it is more specific than most people expect. Paragraph (c) requires each signal person to know and understand the type of signals used — and, if hand signals are used, the Standard Method; to be competent in applying them; to have a basic understanding of equipment operation and limitations, "including the crane dynamics involved in swinging and stopping loads and boom deflection from hoisting loads"; to know the relevant requirements of 1926.1419 through 1926.1422 and 1926.1428; and to demonstrate all of it through an oral or written test and a practical test.

Paragraph (a) gives two routes to that: documentation from a third-party qualified evaluator, or an assessment by the employer's own qualified evaluator. The second is explicitly not portable — another employer may not rely on it. Either way, the documentation is kept available at the site while the signal person is employed, and it must specify each type of signalling the person is qualified for. The next chapter covers what the signals themselves have to be.

4 Operator, and lift director

The operator's authority in the standard is larger than crews sometimes treat it. 1926.1417(o)(2): the operator must not be required to operate the equipment in a manner that would exceed its rated capacity. 1926.1418: whenever there is a concern as to safety, the operator must have the authority to stop and refuse to handle loads until a qualified person has determined that safety has been assured. And 1926.1419(g): if the operator becomes aware of a safety problem and needs to communicate with the signal person, operations stop and do not resume until both agree the problem is resolved.

"Lift director" is not defined in the federal standard — it comes from the consensus standards for cranes, and it appears in 1926.1419(c)(2) only in passing, as one of the people who must agree on non-standard hand signals. Many organisations name one anyway, because somebody has to own the plan and be present. If you use the title, define it in your own program rather than assuming everyone means the same thing by it.

5 Authorized personnel, and everyone else

1926.1424(a)(2)(i) uses a term for the people who are allowed near the machine: authorized personnel, each of whom is trained in how to recognise struck-by and pinch or crush hazard areas posed by the rotating superstructure. Everybody else is kept out by control lines, warning lines, railings or similar barriers.

There is a specific protection for authorized personnel who go somewhere the operator cannot see them. Under (a)(3)(i), before an employee goes to a location in the hazard area that is out of the operator's view, the operator must be informed — by the employee, or by someone the employee instructs. And under (a)(3)(ii), where the operator knows an employee went there, the operator must not rotate the superstructure until informed, through a pre-arranged system of communication, that the employee is in a safe position.

That is a two-way protocol written into the standard, and it only works if the pre-arranged system exists before anyone needs it.

6 Naming the roles out loud

On a small lift, one person may hold several of these roles. That is fine and normal. What is not fine is leaving it implicit, because roles that are assumed are roles nobody performs.

1. 1
   Say the names at the briefing. "Marta is signalling, nobody else. Dev is the qualified rigger. Sam is on the crane."
2. 2
   Say who else is authorised inside the zones, and by implication that everyone else is not.
3. 3
   Say the handover rule. If the signal person has to leave, the lift stops until a replacement is named — only one person signals at a time, 1926.1419(h).
4. 4
   Say the stop rule. Anyone who becomes aware of a safety problem gives the stop or emergency stop signal, and the operator obeys it — 1926.1419(j).

Four sentences at the tailgate. They are the cheapest part of the whole lift and the part that determines whether the rest of it is a controlled operation.