The first thing construction workers see when they report for duty each day at the Louvre Abu Dhabi is a colourful display of art created by the site's health and safety team. It looks like fun – but the message is a serious one.
Of all the works of art you might expect to see at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, an amateur painting of Spider-Man in a body harness is not among them. Although the general public may never view it, it is one of the first things workers see in the small hours as they hop off their buses and pile into the site.
The site’s entrance is quirky: even the three health, safety and environment noticeboards are covered with colourful clip-art.
Elsewhere, four manikins have been dressed in overalls and hard hats, and given power tools to hold.
After nearly three years, the Louvre Abu Dhabi is beginning to resemble the finished “iconic structure that it’s supposed to be”, says Rob Whent, health and safety manager for BuroHappold.
What he also wants it to be is a project that all his workers feel a sense of ownership of.
“We need them to feel part of it, so they can go home and tell their families: ‘Look what I built’,” he says.
The posters are not just about the workers putting their stamp on the project, the visuals have a practical use too.
Although most workers speak one of four languages, says Mr Whent, not everybody does and visuals, especially signage, are crucial.
“Blanket communication” with everybody “just won’t work” he said – which is why the site’s 25 noticeboards display information in seven languages.
The key, Mr Whent says, is to maintain a “continuous visual effect on the workers”.
“It’s a bit like posters, signage and billboards you see in real life – when it changes, you notice it. When it’s been there all week, you ignore it.”
This can mean moving the sign from one location to another, or even “a wholesale change of all the signs across the site”.
At the top of the staircase leading up to the dome is a two-metre high board depicting the outline of a family and a message reminding workers they have loved ones waiting for them.
“When you go up the other staircase, there’s no signage,” says Mr Whent. “People talk about that sign because it’s unusual.”
Now, the team feels its safety standards have “plateaued” – every day the workers are given a “toolbox talk”, or a staff briefing, about the area they are working in, the tasks they will be doing and the risks associated with each.
In the height of summer, about 80 per cent of the work is done during the morning shift – from 5am until around midday.
“It’s very rare, even on this project, for the safety team to stop work,” he explains. “What we try to do is to find an alternative way of continuing work, that is safer.”
Ramadan, this year, he says, did not make as much of a dent in productivity as it usually does.
During the holy month they had an afternoon shift for non-Muslims from 2pm until 6pm, for inside work, and a 3pm until 6pm shift for outside work. One last shift ran 8.30pm until 3.30am.
“The water intake during the summer,” he says, “also makes a lot of difference.” For this reason, the team did not restrict water consumption on-site for non-fasters during Ramadan.
Foremen deliver safety briefs to their groups of workers, speaking in the language of the majority of each group. For those who cannot understand, the rest of the team works together to explain it to them. There is also regular training, delivered in a similar manner.
“Every trade gets task-specific training; every day, they get their safety briefing; every month, everybody gets a general safety topic. So, this month’s topic, because we’re still working in the summer, is about working in the heat and rehydration.”
Mr Whent says once health and safety teams have eradicated unsafe conditions – putting up handrails, installing road crossings and making sure tools are safe – they look to reduce and eliminate instances of unsafe acts, such as people climbing over handrails, or crossing the road in the wrong place.
This month the Tourism Development & Investment Company, the developers of the museum, announced the death of a 28-year-old Pakistani worker in an accident on site, the first since construction began in early 2013.
Making sure the health and safety rules are followed and understood and kept at the forefront of people’s mind is a constant challenge.
“You manage that by using [health and safety] ‘policemen’ – the same as they do on the roads,” says Mr Whent.
“You manage the unsafe acts of driving by putting in more policemen or traffic cameras.
“The law says you have to drive at 80 kilometres-per-hour in a particular area. Now, everybody knows that people break the speed limit a little but when you see a speed camera, everybody slows down; if you see a police car sitting at the side of the road, everybody slows down – and that’s the [health and] safety officer, the policeman of safety.”
That is not the whole solution, he says. People will behave in a particular way when they think they are going to be punished “but that only goes so far”.
“That gets you to a good level but it doesn’t give you the end result that you need. You then need to start changing peoples’ attitudes – so, you want to make them think safely.
“Do you wear your seat belt because the law says you should wear your seat belt, or do you wear your seat belt because you know what the effect is if you don’t wear your seat belt and you then crash?” he asks.
Key to achieving a paradigm shift on site, he says, is “getting in the heads of people and changing the way they think about what they do”, so that they focus on performing tasks safely, rather than quickly.
To do this, the team decided to “do something different”.
It was time to change the entranceway – and what better place to start influencing workers’ perception of health and safety? So near the entrance, the team painted a temporary wall a neutral colour.
They then printed out and laminated 36 flags – representing each nationality working on the project – and stuck these around the centre of the wall. Next they put out a call for artists among the workers who wanted to help with something “a bit unusual”.
“A couple of people came back and said they would like to do something, so we just gave them some paint” and said the only restriction was that whatever they created had to be about the project or safety.
On one side of the wall is an abstract painting of the Louvre dome and a crane. On the other, a close-up illustration of a hammer falling on to a worker’s head – but foiled by a hard hat.
The tour-de-force, however, is a large painting of Spider-Man striking a dramatic pose on top of scaffolding, in a full body harness holding a sign that reads: “Safety First”. As far as visuals go, Mr Whent says, it is a great one because “everybody knows Spider-Man”.
The 47-year-old artist behind the Spider-Man painting, Eugene Canadilla, says Spider-Man is a sensation back home in the Philippines.
“When we see the character of Spider-Man, he has a superpower: to jump from the tops buildings, or from building to building. So, the point is, if even Spider-Man is not exempt from using a full body harness, what about the ordinary people – the workers like us?”
The father of three says he does not paint often – as little as once a year – and usually works in pencil. “Actually, I’m not a painter,” he says, “but I try my best.”
The health, safety and environment officer still managed to complete the Spider-Man painting in just five days.
His superhero is a strong example of someone who “wants to do it safely, rather than having to do it safely”, as Mr Whent puts it, but the image represents much more.
It recognises the workers as active participants of the Louvre project – and their transcendence of language and cultural barriers, to create something of a wonder, together.
halbustani@thenational.ae
