HILL AIR FORCE BASE, Utah — A multi-disciplinary team here led by the 75th Air Base Wing Occupational Safety Office developed a train-the-trainer course for confined space entry to meet an Air Force Safety Center tasking.
The new course eliminated two obsolete computer-based courses, and trains confined space program managers and entry supervisors how to teach the course in a hands-on environment within their specific work centers.
“When someone goes through our course and uses the content to train within their unit, they become compliant with all Air Force and OHSA permit required confined space training requirements. More importantly, they are trained with a performance mindset, focusing on not just completing paperwork, but fully understanding how to safely conduct a permit required confined space entry,” said Adam Sandbek, 75th ABW Occupational Safety manager.
The course was the first train-the-trainer course of its kind to be adopted at the major command level and is available to units across Air Force Materiel Command.
Sandbek states that there wasn’t any guidance, examples, or templates on what the course should look like when safety office team set out to create it. He said the team dove into the project working with multiple units from Hill.
Units that contributed to the development of the course included the 775th Civil Engineer Squadron Fire and Safety Services, 75th Medical Group Bioenvironmental Flight, Ogden Air Logistics Complex Safety and 388th Fighter Wing Safety.
The course puts trainees through realistic scenarios and teaches them how to safely respond to situations they may encounter in their work centers.
“The advantage of this train-the-trainer program is that it puts us in contact with trainers themselves and as they instruct their people, if a question arises, they can easily contact us by picking up a phone,” said Sandbek.
For more information about the course, contact the 75th Occupational Safety Office at 801-777-7233