Published: April 06, 2009 10:51 pm      

Rally promotes work zone safety

ASHLAND — State highway workers and transportation officials took to the road Monday to promote work zone safety.

A fleet of vehicles from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, Kentucky State Police and other agencies made its way south on U.S. 23 from Greenup to Floyd County, making stops along the way for officials to implore motorists to exercise caution in areas where road work is taking place.

The rally was part of National Work Zone Safety Week, which is observed each year at the federal and state level and coincides with beginning of the road construction season.

At a news conference in Ashland, Allen Ravenscraft, safety officer for the Kentucky Department of Highways’ District 9 office in Flemingsburg, said someone is injured in a work zone accident in the United States about every nine minutes and there is a work zone fatality about every 10 hours.

In 2006, three traffic flaggers working for state highway contractors were killed in construction zone mishaps in District 9, which encompasses 10 counties, Ravenscraft said. Three years earlier three state highway workers perished in work zone accidents, he said.

The three keys to work zone safety, Ravenscraft said, are to slow down and observe the speed limits, obey all signs and keep an eye out for workers wearing high-visibility fluorescent-colored clothing.

Bill Manis, an equipment operator with the state highway garage in Greenup County, spoke about a close call he had several years ago while he and his co-workers were patching potholes on Ky. 8. A motorists went around the traffic-control devices that had been set up and came within in just a few feet of striking him with his vehicle, he said.

In fact, Manis said that had he not heard a warning shouted by one of his fellow crew members, “I probably wouldn’t have gone home to my boys that night.”

Manis said there had been other incidents during his 10 years with the highway department where he was forced to dive behind guardrails to avoid being hit.

Officials were hopeful Monday’s rally would serve as a reminder “that thousands of highway workers will be out in force this year, and that their lives are in our hands,” said Boyd Sigler, director of highway safety programs for the Kentucky Office of Highway Safety. “Work zone safety is a concern for everyone on the road.”

KENNETH HART can be reached at khart@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2654.