Glossary — S to Z

Safety Line / Safety Rope / Secondary Rope / Back-up Rope — An anchor line provided as a safeguard to protect against falls if the rope access worker slips, or if the primary means of support (e.g. the working line), anchor or positioning mechanism fails.

Safety Method Statement — A document prepared by the employer describing how a particular job (or types of job where these will be essentially identical) should be undertaken to ensure that any risks to the health and safety of the workers, or others who may be affected, are minimised.

Safe Working Load (SWL) — The maximum load (as certified by a competent person) which an item of equipment may raise, lower or suspend under particular service conditions.

SAIRAA — South African Industrial Rope Access Association.

Semi-Static Rope — Old term for a Low Stretch rope.

Sentry — A person responsible for keeping watch to safeguard the anchorage areas and/or the area of ground below the workers. Such a person should be a full member of the work team and competent for the task but need not be trained in rope access.

SPRAT — Society of Professional Rope Access Technicians (USA).

Static Rope — An old term for rope with lower elongation characteristics than dynamic rope, superseded by the term 'low stretch rope'. Static Rope now only applies to ropes with negligible stretch — e.g. wire or Kevlar — which show little extension at failure and hence having little ability to absorb shock loads.

Suspended Scaffold — Scaffold suspended by means of ropes or chains and capable of being raised or lowered by such means.

Suspension Trauma — A condition in which a person suspended in a harness can experience pallor, cold sweats, nausea, ringing in the ears, blurred vision, dizziness, feeling faint, loss of consciousness and eventual death.

Tensile Strength — The load at which the product no longer has resistance to breakage.

UIAA — Union Internationale Des Associations D'Alpinisme. (International Mountaineering & Climbing Federation.)

UKOOA — United Kingdom Offshore Operators Association.

Via-ferrata — Traditionally a cable-way set up both horizontally and vertically in the Italian Dolomites. By attaching a suitable double lanyard the climber is protected whilst traversing exposed edges or climbs. Very high Fall Factors can be generated in certain circumstances. Some manufacturers have developed energy-absorbing lanyards capable of withstanding these Fall Factors and reducing impact forces on the body to acceptable levels within the mountaineering standards.

WAHR — The Work at Height Regulations 2005.

WHSW — Workplace (Health, Safety & Welfare) Regulations 1996.

Working line / working rope — An anchor line used primarily for suspension, work positioning, work restraint, including descending and ascending.

Working Load Limit (WLL) — The maximum load (as determined by the manufacturer) that an item of lifting equipment is designed to raise, lower or suspend. The WLL does not account for particular service conditions that may affect its final rating.

Work Positioning — Techniques enabling people to work supported in tension or suspension by Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), in a way that a fall is prevented.

Work Restraint — Techniques utilising PPE to prevent a person entering an area where a risk of a fall from a height exists.

Work Seat — A comfort seat for prolonged periods of suspension, with the harness remaining as the primary means of attachment to the anchor lines.

Zero Targeting — The establishment of a system of working which aims to achieve zero accidents, zero waste and zero defects.