The ASME is the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and they produce the National Standards for Safety for all of the crane industry and for hoists, helicopter lifts, junkyard magnet cranes and Telebelts and concrete pumps.

Many of ASME's standards have been adopted by OSHA as the state of the art for safety of the respective industries. It is an honor to be published by ASME, and the B30.27 standard is the Safety Standard for concrete placing equipment.

Right now, the ASME committee is working on adding a responsibilities section to the B30 standards. The ad hoc committee for B30.27 just met again on Tuesday in Dallas, and we finished the wording for the submission that will be presented to the ASME B30 main committee, and, when it passes, to the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) to become a national standard for pumping safety. As an example, picture this scenario: You pull up to the jobsite and the pour supervisor tells you to set up HERE. It then becomes HIS responsibility if the soil is not stable for your outriggers (although you still have to put out your cribbing, of course). You've never been there before, you don't know if they've buried utilities or storage tanks; only the jobsite personnel know that. In the past, a soil failure would have been considered a pumping error. Under the new standard, it will be the responsibility of the person who told you to set up there.

That's the type of situation the responsibilities ad hoc committee is addressing. More information will be forwarded as it happens.

Good luck out there; keep the rubber side down.

 Todd