Smart Connected Safety Gear for Electrical and Welding Trades

Background of the Problem Statement

Electrical maintenance and welding are among the most injury-prone vocational trades in India, with risks including electrical shock, burns, arc-eye, and falls. Standard personal protective equipment (helmets, gloves, insoles, vests) is largely passive; it protects against an incident after it begins but provides no early warning before a hazardous condition develops. Training centres and employers currently have no low-cost way to monitor whether protective gear is being worn correctly, or to detect early indicators of an unsafe condition (elevated body temperature, abnormal gas exposure, an unsafe fall) in real time. Building connected sensing into standard-issue safety gear for these two trades would let trainers and site supervisors intervene before an incident occurs and would generate a usage/incident dataset that can inform future safety curriculum design. Scoping this to electrical and welding trades (rather than all hazardous trades) keeps the prototype achievable within a hackathon build cycle while addressing two of the highest-injury-rate trades in the ITI/training ecosystem.

Description of the Problem Statement

The challenge is to design connected, sensor-embedded safety gear that can: Detect abnormal conditions relevant to the trade - e.g., arc/heat exposure and fall detection for welding; live-circuit proximity and shock-current sensing for electrical work. Transmit real-time alerts to a supervisor/trainer dashboard when a wearer is exposed to an unsafe condition. Operate reliably in workshop conditions (dust, heat, limited connectivity) using low-power wireless communication. Log incidents and near-misses for post-session safety review and curriculum feedback. Remain compatible with standard-issue helmets, gloves, insoles, and vests without materially increasing cost or restricting movement.

Expected Solutions / Outcomes

A working prototype of at least one connected safety item (helmet, glove, vest, or insole) instrumented for one of the two trades. A supervisor-facing real-time alert dashboard. A near-miss/incident log suitable for feeding back into training quality reviews. A cost and durability assessment for centre-scale deployment. Documented alignment with relevant occupational safety standards for the trade.