What is considered a safety shoe?
What is the considered a safety shoe?
Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) is equipment or tools to protect workers from hazards and accidents in working environments. It consists of hand gloves, ear protection, foot protection, safety helmet, safety vest, safety shoe, and respiratory equipment.
Safety Shoe is one essential piece of footwear PPE in the working place. Safety shoe is produced with water-proof leather, PU leather, steel toe cap, steel midsole plate, midsole, insole, and outsole.
In Malaysia, safety shoe requires to meet the standard and safety criteria in ISO standard and Sirim standards, with DOSH approval. SIRIM MS ISO 20345 is commonly used in Malaysia and other countries in Southeast Asia.
What is considered a safety shoe?
What is considered a safety shoe?
Safety footwear is designed to protect feet against a wide variety of injuries. Impact, compression, and puncture are the most common types of foot injury. Choose footwear according to the hazard. Refer to Sirim Standard SIRIM MS ISO 20345 “Protective footwear” or other standards that are required in your jurisdiction.
The importance of Safety Shoe is paramount as a piece of safety equipment PPE that is crucial for workers who are exposed to hazardous working places and environments.
Safety Boots help to protect the worker’s feet from potential occupational hazards such as falling objects, sharp objects, electrical dangers, slipping, and more.
Safety Shoe- Sirim DOSH
All safety shoes in the exact same function way as steel toes shoe, explained above: a layer of tough, durable material likes Steel toe cap / Plastic cap were inserted into the toe box of the boot or safety shoe.
That steel toe cap might look special from the outside, or you might not even know it’s there. The difference is that the material underneath isn’t always steel or plastic.
Features for Safety Shoe
- Water resistant upper
- Antistatic outsole
- Composite or steel toe cap
- Breathable upper
- oil and fuel resistant outsole
- waterproof shoe
- shock absorption
- Slip resistant outsole
- Puncture resistance
What is safety Shoe?
Safety Shoes are historically any shoe which are built with a safety toe, it can be steel, aluminium or composite.
In the beginning, these shoes cap were made of steel and called “Steel Toes”, but now, we have safety shoes made with Aluminum Alloy, Composite Material, and Carbon Fiber (new) safety toes.
These Safety Shoes were originally built to just protect foot and were tested to the ANSI (American National Standards Institute) standards, but then the safety shoe standards were moved to the ASTM (American Standards for Testing and Materials).
Over the years, safety shoes have morphed into several highly specialized shoes that are asked to do much more than protect workers’ toes.
There are Metatarsal Guards that protect the Metatarsal bones in the foot, Electrical Hazard to protect workers from Electrical Shock, Static Dissipating that reduce the build-up of electric static charge on workers, Conductive that reduce the static charge in explosive environments, Puncture Resistant that prevent punctures through the sole, Heat Resistant that protect feet from hot environments, and Slip-Resistant that reduce slipping hazards.
There is also a similar term, “Safe Shoes” that is used to describe shoes built for specific safety needs that don’t have a safety toe. Those include Slip-Resistant safety shoe and Static Dissipating “soft toe” shoes.
