It’s a bird, it’s a plane… no, it’s a Squishy Robot, dropped from a helicopter or a drone to transmit crucial environmental data to emergency responders at disaster scenes.

OSHA’s recent call for comments that may be used to help update its Lockout/Tagout (LOTO) standard highlights an area of growing concern for safety professionals: robotics-human interaction. When the agency’s Control of Hazardous Energy (LOTO) standard was issued in 1989, industrial robots were in use – primarily in manufacturing – but they bore little resemblance to their modern day counterparts. In the 1960s, '70s and '80s, industrial robots were capable of gripping objects, moving them from one point to another and performing assembly tasks.

Thermal processes are used to alter the physical, and sometimes chemical, properties of a material or coating. Two common examples of thermal processing would be high-temperature operations such as heat treating, and low-temperature operations, for instance drying or baking.

Advances in machining and robotics have increased operational efficiency in virtually all manufacturing sectors. Production and profits would plunge if operations were done by hand alone. History has shown us that the advantages of machines are undeniable.

Workplace safety is one of the major concerns that has been successfully driving the international industrial protective clothing fabric market. Today, from hard hats to steel-toed boots, personal protective equipment, often known as PPE, is keeping workers safe from head to toe.

When it comes to workplace safety, welders are well aware that their profession is one of the most dangerous. Welders face an array of hazards from electric shock, retinal damage, ocular melanoma, or serious burns.