This document summarizes a study on safety and health implementation among workers in underground construction projects in Malaysia. The study aimed to identify current safety practices for underground workers and the strategies used to address hazards. Key findings include that underground workers are provided protective equipment like masks and harnesses due to limited oxygen. Workers also undergo mandatory safety training. To address hazards, companies perform risk assessments, inspect work sites, and implement prevention measures like wet drilling and ventilation. The study was limited to the mass rapid transit project in Malaysia and could be expanded to more construction types and companies.

1. A Study Of Safety and Health
Implementation Among
Workers In Underground
Space Workplace (Mass
Rapid Transit’s Project)
Name : Nu ru l Sab ih ah Bt Moh d
Noord in
Matric No. : AP 1 5 0 0 6 1
Su p er vis or : Dr. Su lzakimin B . Hj
Mohamed
University Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia
Faculty of Technology Management and Business

2. CONTENTS
 INTRODUCTION
 PROBLEM STATEMENT
 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES
 SCOPE OF STUDY
 LITERATURE REVIEW
 DATA SOURCES/METHODOLOGY
 DATA ANALYSIS/RESEARCH FINDINGS
 STUDY LIMITATIONS
 SUGGESTIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS
 CONCLUSION

3. INTRODUCTION
• In 2014, construction industry experienced an impressive growth
of 18.9 percent due to the increased performance in all four sub-
sectors which is residential buildings, non-residential buildings,
civil engineering and special trade. This shows that the
importance of the construction sector that clearly contributed to
the country's per capita income. Hence, it is also important for
the contractor to have a high performance and productivity.
• Due to that, it is to be cleared that the safety and health
implementation among workers, especially in underground
space workplace is very important in order to avoid any injuries
and accident occurs.
3

4. FR
CONT….
• MRT was chosen by the researcher as the research site because
of Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) is the highest construction cost for
projects of infrastructures in Malaysia so far (Ministry of
Finance, 2014) that cost 46 billion. To ensure the MRT project
can be done as needed by the client, it is important to
implement a proper implementation of safety measures. This
would help all parties involved to avoid any additional cost and
delay in the future if the accidents happen at the construction
site.
• To understand the real situation of safety in MRT construction
site, it is important to review the accident reports for the MRT
construction from the beginning until to date. For information,
SHASSIC also has been applied in MRT construction with the
aim to reduce accident in MRT projects. However, the incident
seems to continue to happen eventually.
4

5. FR
PROBLEM STATEMENTS
• According to the Malaysia of human resource,
there was an increasing number of accidents
reported to the labour department and Social
Security Organization (SOCSO) from 2009 until
2015.
• Most of the causes of the incident were lack of
general safety awareness and lack of method
statement for work. This actually raised up a
question mark whether the safety measures
that have been implemented by the
construction team suitable for the site
condition.
• This research is make in order to find out
the current implementation of safety and
health especially in underground
workplace, either it is suitable or not in
order to reduce accident at workplace.
The researcher also want to know the
strategies that the company will use to re-
counter this problem.
5

6. • How are the workers in underground
space workplace practices the
safety and health?
• What is the worker’s strategies of
how the workers address hazards at
underground workplace?
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
6

7. RESEARCH OBJECTIVES
7
 To identify the current safety and health
implementation among workers in underground
space workplace.
 To study on strategies of how the workers address
hazards at underground workplace.

8. SCOPEOF
STUDY
8
The respondent for this research will be limited to the main
contractor that involve in the MRT construction project in
Malaysia. For this research, safety officer or project manager
become the key person in providing the crucial info regarding
the way MRT construction site team implement their safety
measures. According to Guldenmun (2007), safety value in
any organization is largely determined by the decisions and
choices made at the organization level even though it only
started once it at the group level.

9. FRLiterature Review
Year Title Author Content
2014
Construction
Project Safety
Schaufelberg
er et al.
“A safe working environment will increase worker productivity and reduces the risk of
injury. This eventually will help the contractor to avoid the accident to happen on the
construction site. Furthermore, accidents are costly and it will lead to a disruption of
the construction schedule and demand a significant management time for
investigating and reporting.”
2012
Workplace
Accident in
Malaysia: Most
Common Causes
and Solutions
Zakaria et.
al.,
“If accident continues to happen, it will increase the total cost of the construction
project. This shown that it is important to have knowledge about the factors of
accidents to happen and how this factor could influence the safety measures, in order
to prevent any accident from happening.”
9

10. FR
10
Causes of Construction Accidents Literature Review
Human
Human error
(Zhi et. al, 2003; Garret and Teizer, 2009, Navon and Kolton,
2006, Card and McCall, 1996)
Insufficient safety training and education
(Wadick, 2010, Chan et. al, 2004, Liu et. al, 2007)
Fatigue
(Chan, 2011)
Worker’s motives to derive short-term benefits
(Gilkey et. al, 2012)
Hectic Schedule
Hectic schedule
(Li et. al, 2013)
Carelessness and indifferent attitudes, ignorances or
lack of training and working experiences, lack of
discipline, distraction and poor communication
(Debrah et al, 2001)

11. DATA SOURCES/METHODOLOGY
Methodology
Primary data
Interview of MRT
Projects Main
Player
Secondary data
Journals
Report
Website
The main instrument used in this research is interview. For
this interview, the persons of interviewed are mostly from the
contractor that involves in MRT projects which is Safety
Manager, Senior Safety and Health manager and Head of
Safety and Health Department. Furthermore, these people
were chosen is because of their experience in construction
industry especially in safety and health scope in this country
and know about how this industry works.

12. RESPONDENTS
12
Respondent Company Position Department Place
R1 Meiden-Malaysia
Joint Venture
Safety, Health and
Environment
Manager
Safety and Health
Department Putrajaya
R2 WCT Berhad Senior Safety,
Health and
Environment
Manager
Safety and Health
Department
TRX Station Site
Office, KL
R3 Mass Rapid Transit
Corporation
Chief Head of
Safety and Health
Department
Safety and Health
Department MRT Corp Office, KL

13. 13

14. 14

15. DATA ANALYSIS

16. DATA ANALYSIS
(STEPS)
1. Data is organized and prepare for analysis.
2. Read through all the data collected
3. Begin detail analysis with coding process
4. Coding process is used to generate a
description of the setting or people as well
as categories or themes for analysis
5. Themes and description is
presented in a table form
6. The final step it making
interpretation or meaning
of the data

17. SUMMARY OF
RESEARCH FINDINGS
17
Research Objectives Research Questions Findings
To identify the current safety
and health implementation
among workers in underground
space workplace.
How are the workers in
underground space
workplace practices the
safety and health?
1. For underground worker they provide
them a respiratory protective
equipment (RPE) since when working
underground, they will exposed to
harmful gas and has insufficient oxygen.
2. Their workers wear the special mask
and harness for underground work
since the oxygen in underground is so
limited.
3. They also send their workers to undergo
the training and it is compulsory for
every worker that will working in
underground space and they gain
exposure from the training.

18. SUMMARY OF
RESEARCH FINDINGS
18
Research Objectives Research Questions Findings
To study on strategies of
how the workers address
hazards at underground
workplace.
What is the worker’s
strategies of how the
workers address
hazards at underground
workplace?
1. Prevention of exposure to dust should in the first
place be implemented by technical means, such as
wet drilling (and/or drilling with LEV), wetting of the
material before it is pulled down and loaded to the
transport, LEV of mining machines and mechanical
ventilation of tunnels.
2. They identify the hazard by carrying out a workplace
risk assessment. Then they determine how employees
might be at risk and they evaluate the risk. Lastly,
they record and review the hazards at least annually
or earlier if something changes.
3. Inspect the workplace for safety hazards. Regularly
inspect the workplace for hazards can help identify
shortcomings so that they can be addressed before an
incident occurs.

19. 19
STUDY
LIMITATIONS
The findings and results were based on the MRT
construction in Malaysia
A bigger and better coverage in other types of
construction such as bridges, highways and high
rises buildings would add and enrich the findings.
However, it was not the focus of this research.
The respondent’s constraint of time due to thei
busy work schedule.

20. FR
20
SUGGESTIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS
Conducting human factors and ergonomics research relevant to the design and organization of
MRT work tasks to improve worker safety by reducing hazardous exposures and effectively using
PPE
Examine long-term practice change and safety culture implementation related to educational
interventions
Develop, implement, and evaluate comprehensive leadership and training strategies and
interventions that go beyond simple knowledge-based training
Expand questionnaire to cover more construction companies, especially the small to medium size
ones as they are the ones more prone to paying less attention to health and safety rules as been
shown by the questionnaires.

21. FR
21
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE
RESEARCH
This study only focused the MRT construction work in Malaysia
• become more relevant and valuable to future researcher to cover on another
region of the world based on the findings of this research.
To improves the findings of this research in future
• the future researcher should cover other type of construction work in
Malaysia such as high rises, bridges, and highways. In order to enrich the
findings based on this research.

22. FR
CONCLUSION
22
Research Objectives 1: The construction site has immediate and structured safety practices namely safety
policy, education and training, site safety inspection, safety auditing, safety meeting and personal protection
equipment.
All of the safety measures and assessment was based on the OSHA 1994.
Public awareness would influence the safety measures in MRT construction site in Malaysia.
Research Objective 2: They identify the hazard by carrying out a workplace risk assessment and through
training required by the contractor.
Helps to explore the safety and health implementation and hazards addressing that already been used inside
the MRT construction site.

23. Nurul Sabihah Binti Mohd Noordin
013-9609426
sabihahnrdn@gmail.com
THANK YOU