Danger Signs

Danger signs and what makes one compliant

A danger sign is not simply a sign that mentions a hazard. Under AS 1319, the standard covering safety signs for the occupational environment, the word DANGER is reserved for a specific thing: a hazard that will cause death or serious injury if the instruction is ignored. It is set in white on a red oval inside a black rectangle, above a message panel. That header is the part that carries the meaning, and it is why a hand-lettered warning taped to a hoarding does not do the same job.

Where the hazard is real but the consequence is lower, AS 1319 uses WARNING or CAUTION instead. Getting that grading right matters on a site where people see dozens of signs a day — a DANGER header used for a trip hazard teaches everyone to stop reading them.

What this range covers

Just under fifty legends, weighted towards construction and electrical hazards. Excavation and demolition in progress, deep excavations, workers below, crane working overhead, formwork stripping, explosive powered tools in use. Electrical: live wires, high voltage, high voltage overhead, underground cables, electrical equipment. Access control: keep out, keep out authorised personnel only, construction site unauthorised persons keep out. Plus asbestos removal in progress, flammable materials, explosives keep out, machinery in operation and no smoking.

Several are available with custom text, which is the right option when the hazard on your site does not map onto a stock legend.

Specifying for site conditions

Five materials are offered, from $7.50:

• Sticker or decal — for plant, switchboards and smooth surfaces where a rigid panel will not sit flat.
• Corflute — the usual construction choice. Light, cheap, cable-tied to a fence, and genuinely disposable at the end of the stage.
• Polypropylene — a step up in rigidity for semi-permanent positions.
• Composite ACM, white — rigid and weather-stable for a permanent outdoor position.
• Aluminium 1.6mm — for post mounting and for long-term installation on plant and substations.

Four sizes run from 300 × 225mm to 900 × 600mm landscape. Size follows viewing distance: a sign on a switchboard door is read from a metre away, one on a site hoarding from across a road, and the same legend will not serve both.

Placement

A danger sign works at the point of decision — the gate, the hatch, the panel, the edge of the excavation. Placed on an office wall it becomes wallpaper. Under WHS duties the sign is part of controlling a hazard, never the control itself; it supplements a physical barrier rather than replacing one.