Safety helmets are mandatory pieces of equipment and attire on any construction site in New York. They are not only used by construction workers, but also by managers, inspectors, engineers, OSHA inspectors, surveyors, architects, as well as all visitors and apprentices. Their use is one of the main elements of protection against head injuries, but they also serve a greater purpose - identification. The color matching and coordination of helmets helps distinguish individual roles and positions.

White, yellow, red, blue, green, orange and black are the most common helmet colors found on construction sites. Most often, they define the position of the person wearing them and the function they perform at their workplace. They facilitate the recognition of individual employees and guarantee a level of safety due to their better visibility. This rather unnoticed level of labeling can prevent many construction injuries and fatalities. The most common differentiation for the colors is as follows:

• White: site manager, engineer, or supervision inspector
• Yellow: manual worker
• Red: guest, intern, apprentice
• Blue: machine operator or electrician
• Green: OSHA worker
• Orange: Surveyor
• Black: architect

The use of colored safety helmets symbolizes an organized workplace. However, wearing colored helmets in accordance with a position or role is not regulated by law. To that end, it is not uncommon that a helmet of a given color is worn by an employee who has no function associated with it.

The color of helmets comes as second nature to people working in the New York construction industry, but not every state operates equally. Each plant has the right to specify the colors it uses in its internal regulations, but many managers use the same, generally understood principle of assigning colors. However, international construction sites’ color labeling may differ tremendously from those in the United States. For example, the color gray may be used for guests instead of red. For this reason, before starting work and when reading the internal company regulations, it is worth getting acquainted with the colors of helmets used on any one construction site.