Getting Personal About Protection

Brian Shiels, the Senior PPE Engineer at ArcWear and a long-standing member of many standards development organizations joins this episode of Standards Impact, the Official Podcast of ASTM International. Brian is also the current Vice-Chair of ASTM’S Personal Protective Equipment Committee (F23) and he joins host Dave Walsh to talk all about the critical work being done to ensure the quality of PPE, especially in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. Then later, JP Ervin discusses the important work being done by ASTM’s amusement rides and devices committee who are dedicated to bettering the amusement ride industry.  So press play and get ready for another exciting inside look into the world of standards.

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Transcript

Voiceover (00:06):

Standards are everywhere from the floor beneath your feet, to the aircraft above your head. This is standards impact presented by ASTM International.

Dave Walsh (00:21):

Welcome to Standards Impact, the official podcast of ASTM International. I'm your host, Dave Walsh, editor in chief of ASTMs Flagship publication Standardization News. Today we're joined by Brian Shiels, senior PPE engineer at Arc Ware, and a longstanding member of many standards development organizations. He's the current vice chair of ASMs, personal Protective Equipment Committee F 23. Brian, you have degrees in chemistry and textiles from the University of South Carolina and North Carolina State respectively. Was it your plan to get involved in the field of protective clothing or did you just happen upon it because it seems like a plan.

Brian Shiels (01:00):

I'm glad it seems that way in hindsight, but really it wasn't a plan, but it came together really kind of a neat way. So finishing up at University of South Carolina, they have this, they call it capstone course for all their seniors. They probably have it in other degrees as well, but certainly all the seniors in chemistry. We took this capstone course and it was, you're getting ready to walk out of here with a degree from this university, and understandably, we don't want you flipping burgers. We want you to be able to go do something in the real world. We covered things, resume preparation, which you might do afterward. And then we also had a series of guest speakers throughout the semester, folks from academia, folks from industry, all different types of industries, different things you might go into. And one of the guest speakers happened to be a professor from NC State University, happened to be in the College of Textiles.

(01:51):

And he said, in my plan at the time was I knew I was going to go to graduate school. I assumed I would go get another chemistry degree and then eventually do something. And he said, I'm a little biased towards textiles, but my recommendation is get something apply, whether it's material science, forestry, graduate degree in engineering, whatever it may be, but get something applied so that you can go get a job afterward. Obviously the goal here. So that kind of spoke to me and I went and checked out the College of Textiles there at NC State Color Science was really cool to me as a chemist, so I thought, let's give that a try. And then at NC State, the way the College of Textiles worked your first semester, you weren't necessarily tied into a project or a research advisor. So here I was a first semester graduate student with a degree in chemistry walking around the College of Textiles.

(02:39):

And sure enough, the protective clothing lab there, tpac, textile Protection and Comfort Center, they had a brand new project given by the Department of Homeland Security. This was shortly after nine 11, and they were tasked with adding chemical and biological protection on board firefighter turnout gear at all times. So they've got the protection and comfort side of things locked in, but they didn't really have a whole lot of expertise in chemistry. So they said, who can do this chemical protective side of things? And we found our way together and they said, Hey, do you want to work on this project with us? And since that day, I've never done anything other than protective clothing wasn't really a plan, but I couldn't have asked for anything better to come together.

Dave Walsh (03:17):

That's enough of a coincidence. But the fact that A STM has a personal protective equipment committee, F 23, which is tailor made for your skillset, was also a coincidence. So how did you end up getting involved with A STM specifically and the world of standards development in general?

Brian Shiels (03:32):

Sure. As that first semester grad student, when I got into the protective clothing lab, and it's this project, I started working right away with two A STM standard test methods. In particular, I was A-S-T-M-F 9 0 3 and A-S-T-M-F 7 39. I was thrown right in the pool feet first and started working with those standards. And as anyone who works with standards start to find things that could be better with them and start to learn that process that you find something that could be better with a standard. It's as simple as submitting a proposal to the subcommittee form a task group and make those changes immediately Started participating in that way, providing feedback through my advisors, through the university who were members. And then ultimately when I finished there and went into the working world, I got into industry, I became a member of ATM and of course joined that committee right away.

Dave Walsh (04:24):

It was really during the pandemic that A STM and your committee F 23 received an incredible amount of notoriety. It's almost unprecedented in ASTMs history, at least the recent history as far as anyone knew, and I've never seen anything like it when suddenly barrier face coverings were needed mandatory. They were part of everyday society. And so that was F 20 three's finest hour. They came up with the standard F 35 0 2, and they did it in a pretty short period of time. Maybe you could tell us about some of the work that went into that and how it all came together, because it's a pretty extraordinary story.

Brian Shiels (05:02):

I almost said, when you're asking the question, I almost said it was record time. I don't know if it was record time, but certainly for committee F 23, I've never seen a standard go through more quickly. And in a lot of ways, frankly, we've got a little scrutiny for that. Some people thinking we maybe pushed it through, but we're proud to say we held strong to all of the A SM regulations and got all the appropriate thorough review. But it really showed what the committee can do to build consensus when something's important for the worldwide community. Really at that point, these products were being used. We all remember folding up a bandana, putting over your face, whatever, but there was nothing in place to really say whether it was doing anything for you or not. Our subcommittees, we have subcommittees on biological hazards, subcommittees on respiratory hazards.

(05:48):

These groups came together and put together the various tests that might be run on them, the performance specifications that these products need to meet to really be protective and effective for the users of them. And it was just incredible. It was less than a year. I think it was about nine months we had a standard out there and published and enforce. So that's not always the case, but it was really a testament to the purpose of why we're all here. We're here, we make these standards, whether they're test methods or specifications, whatever they are, we make 'em for the greater good of the end users and we got that done for the world.

Dave Walsh (06:24):

Alright. Maybe a good way to give the background for our listeners is maybe you could tell us a little bit about what 35 0 2 cover specifically, what does that standard cover and why was it so useful?

Brian Shiels (06:35):

Sure. F 35 0 2 covers particulate filtration efficiency. We also look at a designer of these face coverings has to do something to prevent leakage around the outside, and we also look at breathing rate through it. There's lots of ways to block particulates, but you can't breathe underneath. And so it defeats the purpose very quickly, or it blocks particulates and then everything leaks around the outside so that you can breathe. And if it's not going through the filter media or the face covering at all, then it's not blocking those particulates. Those are the three things we really look at with that, just to make sure that, again, you're not just putting a piece of fabric over your face, you're making sure that actually the air that you want to filter goes through that material. You can comfortably breathe through it, nothing escapes around the outside, and at that point it becomes something that's protective, not only for you as aware, but for those around you from any particulates coming from you.

Dave Walsh (07:32):

And that could be for any type of mask, really, any type of face covering really.

Brian Shiels (07:37):

Sure. Yeah. This was really designed around these barrier face coverings, cloth face coverings as they were initially called. That was one. Not only did we create this standard very quickly, we immediately put it in for revision, and it was constantly a live document as all A STM standards are. But that's one of the most recent changes is that we've adjusted to harmonize the language and now it's a barrier based covering as opposed to a cloth based covering.

Dave Walsh (08:01):

You touched on this already, but what role did a S TM standard development process play in the development of 35 0 2 in terms of facilitating the process? And as you say, it was a rapid process compared to maybe other processes. How did this influence that standard?

Brian Shiels (08:18):

Yeah, so that's a great question. And I am involved with many other standards development organizations around the world as well. And where I think A STM is really unique is the fact that it does allow for a short cycle like this, whether it's a new standard or a revision of a standard, we have to ballot things for 30 days. So the membership has a month to review whatever they want to or whatever's proposed, but there's no fixed revision cycle. There's no fixed issue cycle for any new or revised standards, whereas some of them are, say, revised on a five year cycle. So if something comes about, and a lot of times they have means of making changes on an emergency basis, but you're really bound to that schedule, and we don't have that in A SCM standards. So the idea comes about if we put the time and effort in to get the technical language together and a task group likes it, then it goes to ballot to subcommittee, the subcommittee votes on it, and then it can go to the ballot for the full committee.

(09:15):

So in theory, it could happen in about two and a half months. Obviously we took a little closer to eight or nine months, I think, with this one, but that's a testament that we didn't hit it on the first ballot cycle. We get good feedback, make constructive changes to the document, and eventually we build consensus. But that can happen every month on a case where something is necessary to run quickly. They don't all happen that way. Sometimes they can take five or six years or longer to gain consensus, but this was a great example where that short cycle in the A SCM regulations for that 30 day ballot cycle really work to our advantage to get a standard out there very quickly.

Dave Walsh (09:54):

And this process brings all stakeholders to the table as well, right? It's manufacturers, it's I assume, medical experts. It was all different people from all different areas came together for

Brian Shiels (10:03):

This. Sure. And as any member of any a CM committee will be able to tell you, balance is a very important piece of the membership and the roster maintenance that we do. We do keep a balance of producers can be no more than half of the interest there. It's not something like all these mask producers came together and wrote a standard so they could sell more masks. It really was a group effort, a combination of users, general interest members, laboratory representatives like myself, medical professionals that are relying on, I mentioned the surgical mask earlier, medical professionals that rely on those first responders that would rely on the public using these masks for their protection. And it has to come together as a kind of blended consensus like that.

Dave Walsh (10:49):

So barrier face coverings are probably the most well known form of PPE, and it certainly was critical in ASTMs story, but you and your organization work on numerous types of protective equipment. So can you tell us a little about some of the other areas within this field and why they're important?

Brian Shiels (11:06):

Sure. Aside from my graduate work when I was in chemical protective clothing, I mentioned that was adding that chemical protective clothing onto firefighter turnout gear. Since graduate school, my entire career has been focused on flame resistant clothing Committee F 23 was a committee on protective clothing and equipment. We span all different types of hazards. I particularly chair the flame and thermal hazard subcommittee, and that's been my bread and butter. That's what my organization does. I'm with the ARC wear division of trics. And so arc wear, as the name suggests, we were founded in arc flash protection, an electrical work or a lineman, someone working in an electrical panel. If something goes wrong that the wrong thing touches the wrong thing, a tool hits the wrong place and you have an arc flash. With arc flash, we're not talking about electric shock hazards, but at that point, you're standing an arm's length away effectively from a lightning bolt.

(11:59):

There's a ton of thermal energy that comes from that. We have apparatus to test how much thermal energy comes through that protective clothing and would expose the skin. Are you at risk of a second or third degree burn through that clothing? ARC rated clothing is all flame resistant. So that's the first step is making sure you don't have any ignition. But then we're going to look at how much thermal energy that clothing system or layers of clothing can provide protection against. We also do all other types of clothing. We do flash fire protective clothing for more industrial type of incidents. Those will be like your coveralls that are in plant workers or oil rig workers, things like that where a flash fire may occur. We also do testing for firefighter protective clothing. That's a little bit beefier. That's for scenarios where a firefighter is deliberately walking into a burning building.

(12:50):

An arc flash or a flash fire is something that you have to be prepared for if something goes wrong. But firefighting is a little bit different. Something has already gone wrong and these folks are walking into that scenario. But even firefighter clothing, the obvious risk is the fire, but there are so many tests and so many ASTM standards that we lean on in that industry. You're looking at walkway safety. You don't think necessarily about walkway safety as a firefighting application, but walkway safety has a ton of standards for the boots, the protective footwear that first responders are wearing. And then of course, gloves, helmets, you got impact stuff that you might think more about sports equipment that A SCM and of course SEI deal in the certification of that sports equipment. But a lot of those tests for impact protection from helmets and things like that can also be applied to protective clothing for occupational use.

Dave Walsh (13:43):

So I'm wondering if this must be gratifying work to do and knowing that you're helping people be safer on their jobs. And just out of curiosity, are there any metrics that you use? Have you seen incidents or injuries go down your organization? Must be proud of that if they

Brian Shiels (13:58):

Exist? Yeah, absolutely. We track those burn injuries and how they've changed as standards evolved. And there are other standards development organizations involved here as well. But NFPA particularly has a standard NFPA 70 E that started dictating what the protective clothing has to do. When it first came about, it said the protective clothing just has to not contribute to the injury, so not make it any worse. If I'm exposed to an arc in the clothes I'm wearing today, these clothes will ignite, these clothes will contribute to that injury. Not only I have the injury from the arc flash, but now I have the injury from the sustained fire that my clothing is contributing to. So that was the baseline and things started to get a little bit better just not doing that. But then as we added A-S-C-M-F 1506, the specification for the wearing apparel for electrical workers, and we added that, it had to be arc rated clothing, it had to be flame resistant. It's got some tear resistance properties, other things like that. We did see those burn injuries start to go down and the fatalities start to go down. So it was a really great testament to see how standards could impose proper work practices in that industry and cause those injuries to come down.

Dave Walsh (15:09):

You touched on another organization in your answer there, the National Fire Protection Association, the N-F-P-A-A-S-T-M is very proud to say that they partner with numerous organizations out there and the NFPA is one of them. How does your work with A STM International play a role with the NFPA and how does it overlap?

Brian Shiels (15:26):

It's a constant overlap, in fact. So in addition to my work on the various committees and subcommittees at A STM, I'm also a member of a few technical committees at NFPA, and there's entire chapters in every NFPA standard that is geared around test methods. So there's a section on requirements and that's going to say, go do this test and the result has to be X, Y, or Z to be compliant with this standard. And then you go to that test method section. And although other standards test methods are referenced, there are dozens and dozens of A STM standard test methods that are always referenced there. We have liaison at each of our subcommittee meetings that we'll talk about what's happening at the NFPA meeting, what's happening at the ISO Protective Clothing Committee and how can we respond, how should we respond from a standards test, methods development perspective, what we need to change, what modifications we might need to make to our test methods to be useful to the groups that are using 'em, that are those that are writing the specifications.

Dave Walsh (16:29):

Another organization that you work overlaps with is an affiliate of A STM, full disclosure, the Safety Equipment Institute. And you mentioned them in one of your previous answers as well. So how does your work overlap with s e's work and what's the connection there?

Brian Shiels (16:42):

Yes, so in fact, I had a client on the phone yesterday that I was giving this full explanation to the answers at the top of mind here, but so SEI, they're an ISO 17 0 6 5 accredited certification organization. So they're involved with putting their mark on a product that says it is fully compliant with whatever the standard might be, but in order to apply that mark, that certification mark to a product, that product has to first be evaluated in an ISO 17 0 2 5 accredited testing organization. So that's where we come into play Connect arc. We're a accredited testing organization and SEI is an accredited certification organization. So they would rely on labs like ours to provide the accredited testing service that they would then take that data from our testing and apply it to their certification.

Dave Walsh (17:30):

We're getting to the end of our time to an extent here, but what's a fact about protective equipment that people may not know? What's something that would surprise our listeners are some of the pieces of clothing we wear every day ARC rated. Is there anything that would surprise a casual listener?

Brian Shiels (17:46):

Yeah, so I think what would surprise, and I think it's probably obvious that a helmet, you are a bicycle helmet, a personal flotation device where you see, we will say US Coast Guard approved. It's been tested to a variety of standards, but there's a lot of stuff that gets tested that you probably wouldn't realize. And I'm laughing here because I love all things sports as well. I love all things protective clothing. It's my passion. But I do love all things sports. I'm actually involved in an adult kickball league and our uniforms this year, our jerseys were this horrendous, bright yellow, you know me, we work in high visibility, safety apparel. That's one of the products that we test. And I took one look at this jersey and I said, this has got to be, this truly is high vis there's a difference between say bright yellow and what is a true high vis.

(18:35):

So I started looking into the fabric and looking into the material and sure enough, it's compliant with the standard on high visibility, safety apparel, obviously not what we're using it for. It wasn't my choice. It probably wouldn't have been my choice, but just that how much overlap is there and where standards are really in every part of your life, whether you realize it or not. Again, I mentioned the standards on walkway safety and we use them for the various protective footwear, but it goes into the carpet and the floor covering that's in my office now and near homes. And there's so much overlap to general wearing apparel and protective clothing. So much to the point that A STM keeps all three of those committees. There's the Committee on Walkway Safety, the Committee on Personal Protective Clothing and Equipment, and a committee on textiles, walkway safety and textiles can be general commodity things, but they also have such an important influence on the protective clothing standards. Those three committees meet at the same time every time. So that's really convenient because a lot of the same experts will play in all of those committees. So just how much of a tangled web it is, I think is probably the most surprising bit.

Dave Walsh (19:41):

Now I'm wondering though, would those kickball jerseys be, would you be able to use them on a road crew or something at a construction site? Would that be rated for it?

Brian Shiels (19:48):

Just because the fabric is compliant doesn't mean the garment is. So we would have to do a further evaluation on the garment to make sure there's a little detail, like the right amount of surface area of that high visibility material before it's compliant. You can't just put a patch on there that's the right color. It has to be the full Garmin in a minimum amount of surface area, but we could certainly test it. I haven't run it through the lab yet, but at least from a fabrics perspective it was compliant.

Dave Walsh (20:13):

Alright, here's a question we've been asking every guest and you can go anyway, what you want with it. I think we will have to rule out F 35 0 2, but otherwise, what is your favorite standard? You can go anywhere with it. It can be funny, it can be practical, it can be something odd that you found.

Brian Shiels (20:30):

Yeah, so I'm going to give you two and hopefully others will do that as well. And I'm not the only one that's going off the rails and giving you two, but one from an absolute practical perspective as SCMF 1959, that's our arc rating standard. That's the one we use all day every day. My business and my business relies on that standard. So it's by far my favorite. The sentimental one, and I'm going to go back to my days at NC State University and the Textile Protection Comfort Center is as STMF 1930. That's a flash fire mannequin test. NC State Athletics use this flash fire mannequin in their commercials during football games. It's something that group is very proud of. There are other mannequins around the world. That's one I'm particularly fond of because that's where I grew up in protective clothing. But if you haven't had a chance to see A-S-C-M-F 1930, a flash fire mannequin test in person, you can stand five feet away from it behind some pretty thick fireproof glass.

(21:24):

But to feel the heat, see the light, and just imagine the misfortune of an industrial worker who is exposed to a flash fire and you go home thankful every day that you're not exposed to one. But the fact that the work that we do to develop these standards, develop the clothing, to test the clothing that provides that protection, gives some hope to that person that maybe has the unfortunate exposure to that type of a flash fire that they can go home safely to their families. It's something as simple as a standard test method can do that for people. And I think that's really cool.

Dave Walsh (21:58):

And with football season ramping up, that sounds like one more reason to root for NC State over UNC. So there

Brian Shiels (22:04):

You go. And not that you need one. Yeah.

Dave Walsh (22:07):

Alright. Thanks for being with us here today, Brian. And now it's time for our regular standard spotlight segment with SNS content editor. JP Urban

JP Ervin (22:19):

Amusement rides are a beloved hallmark of summer, whether it be a quick day at the boardwalk or a family trip to a destination theme park, people eagerly anticipate the thrills of roller coasters, water slides, wave pools go-karts and other attractions because of their popularity and their complexity. Amusement rides also depend on standards. For this reason, ASTMs committee on amusement rides and other devices has prioritized developing strong standards for more than 40 years. One of the committee's core standards is the practice for ownership, operation maintenance and inspection of amusement rides and devices where F seven 70, this fundamental standard addresses a wide range of aspects of how amusement rides are operated, maintained and inspected. The practice contains many requirements including documentation, signage, testing, training for operators and patron responsibilities. F 7 70 0 also contains a lengthy section on recording incidents that occur because of amusement rides and devices along with notifying manufacturers about such incidents.

(23:23):

ASTMs Amusement rides and devices committee has about 1000 members, which includes a broad range of engineers, manufacturers, and owners, along with academics, regulators, and safety advocates who are dedicated to bettering the amusement ride industry. The committee cites not only its motivation to reduce serious incidents and ensure effective operations, but also a strong sense of ethics about why they do what they do. There has been a nearly 50% reduction in reported injuries from 2003 to 2021. Major operators such as Disney, universal and Six Flags require the use of F 7 70 0 in their facilities. Regulators around the world also rely on the standard. More than 40 US states cite standards from the amusement rides and devices committee and more than 14 countries around the world report the use and adoption of F seven 70.

Dave Walsh (24:20):

If you want to learn more about any of the standards discussed in this episode, visit astm.org for all the latest. And if you enjoyed the show today, remember to like and subscribe so you never miss another episode. I'm Dave Walsh, and this has been Standards Impact presented by A STM International.