Although you may not think of hearing protection as being associated with electrical and electronic repair, it is. Consider the area in which you will be working. Hearing loss is a problem in the Navy. Every day, you may be working with and around noisy equipment and machinery that could damage your hearing. In most cases, the damage will not happen overnight; it will happen slowly.

Your hearing may degrade until you will not be able to hear the softer sounds as well as you could have

Figure 3-7.-DANGER Tag (NAVSHIPS 9890/8).

if you had worn hearing protection. This is commonly called a hearing threshold shift. It simply means that the more you are exposed to damaging levels of noise, the louder normal sounds must be for you to hear them.

You must start now to protect yourself from hearing loss. OPNAVINST 5100.23 states that all personnel must wear hearing protective devices when they enter or work in an area where the operations generate noise levels of greater than 84 decibels. If you are in doubt about whether a noise level is high enough

Table 3-8.-Safety Shorting Probe Procedure

to require hearing protection, err toward the side of safety. Protect your hearing!

RESPIRATORY PROTECTION

It is very important to use the proper respiratory protection when you use hazardous paints, solvents, and other materials associated with cleaning and maintaining electronic equipment and antennas. Be sure to ask your supervisor about the need for respiratory protection whenever you

chip lead- or chromate-based paints while removing corrosion,

prime or paint the bases of antennas, or

clean circuits with spray solvents or alcohol.

Whenever you perform these operations, be sure that the work area has good ventilation. This will help prevent you from over-inhaling hazardous vapors and dusts.