Jump to content

Children Performing At Height


sparklelard

Recommended Posts

All, I been trawling through the HSE and Government legislation regarding children performing at height.,

 

I have a production coming up soon and the director has asked for the children to perform on steel deck 7 feet off the ground.

 

With adults, we have a safety rail at a height of 3 feet.

 

I get a little bit twitchy about children, with no adults on the deck, and their safety.

 

Any advise, links etc?

 

Simon

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The risk is essentially the same - performers at height can fall off the structure so you need to control the likelihood of that happening. It's especially tricky around young performers/children because they can also succumb to the temptation of 'horeseplay' especially without adult/older performers around.

 

You need a detailed discussion with the director about how they see the raised level being part of the show - is it for a single performer (or a small group) where the risk can be controlled with a toe board, white line, handrail and thorough rehearsal or is it going to be a chorus of performers in which case you might well be in the territory of something like weldmesh, steel reinforcing 'web' or pucka handrails for the decking that will be less conspicuous (and could perhaps be concealed by scenery cut outs)?

 

I have lit shows in the past with young performers on high levels where the risk was controlled by much rehearsal and keeping the "lively" ones off the high level so it can be done safely - in fact the only performance accident I was ever present for was in a drama studio and someone didn't 'feel' the gap between the bridge section of the gallery and the dock door until it was too late.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Too many imponderables for specific answers but there is little legislation that directly addresses the H&S of children as amateur performers. HSWA is "at work" so strictly speaking does not apply. HSE does state that they would expect the same levels of care toward amateurs.

 

It is all risk assessment and risk management, taking adequate consideration for the youth, fragility, inexperience and lower self discipline levels of young people. Questions that need answering include; why is this necessary, how many performers, how big a platform, how old are performers, what ability levels, how can you arrange safe access/egress, are there blackout/lighting problems, can you use restraining harness and many more.

 

Do give us more details, there are people here who have done this many times. If in doubt, however, be over-cautious.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Too many imponderables for specific answers but there is little legislation that directly addresses the H&S of children as amateur performers. HSWA is "at work" so strictly speaking does not apply. HSE does state that they would expect the same levels of care toward amateurs.

 

Isn't there a something somewhere that says that 'volunteers' have the same rights as employees when it comes to the HSAWA?

 

I've tackled this sort of thing in the school I used to work at a few times- we were relatively lucky in that the rehearsals took place in the theatre and I was able to build the set in the half-term preceding the show (which would generally be about 4-5 weeks later.

 

Because we had so much time, my approach was to initially build the set with full handrails, give them the 'don't lean on the front handrails or eventually you'll fall off' spiel, then come tech week, after I'd observed the rehearsals happening, I'd remove as few rails as I could to keep it safe, but at the same time as many as I could to improve the visual aspect of the performance, then take the cast on another walkaround to show what had changed. I've also followed a similar approach for some young company shows that have a couple of weeks intensive rehearsal, followed by a show week, but obviously in a slightly more sped up fashion. Usually anyone who isn't directed up there would have been forbidden to go on the raised areas.

 

At the end of the day, it's down to your risk assessments, and how much you feel you can trust the company not to misbehave (most of the young people I've had to work with have been pretty responsible).

 

Ian

 

Edited to add:

I may be shot down for this, but I can't stand the 'it's a raised area and there's kids so we need to handrail the hell out of it for all eternity' approach that some people have- especially if you're talking about those who should (in theory) be able to think for themselves, such as secondary school age. Yes, they're young, and yes they may be a bit immature, but that doesn't by default mean they're going to start jumping off a piece of 7' high decking. It all comes back to sensible (dynamic) risk assessments, and the person responsible being both respected, and in control of the situation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

At the STSG Conference last weekend, ABTT updated us on the new revisions to the Yellow Book which includes updates on handrails on stage, in particular off stage and backstage. I don't think the revisions have been fully published yet but should be shortly.

 

I think the headline was something along the lines of only being able to remove the handrails when it is a) detrimental to the design and b) the risk can be reduce through rehearsal. Anywhere a member of the audience is likely to go (e.g. if brought onstage during Panto) needs to be treated as any public area and offstage and rear of stage should have standard 1100, 600, toeboard handrails.

 

I might not have that exactly right though, so it would be worth seeking a copy of the updated book (updates are available online for those with a hard copy).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.