East Africa: Detecting lightning on our tea estates
After months without rain, the long spring rainy season comes as a relief to East Africans. Less welcome is the lightning.
Every year, many people are injured and sometimes killed by lightning during monsoon storms.
Using the latest technology to protect our employees from lightning strikes
In Kenya and Tanzania, Unilever Tea East Africa grows and processes black and green tea used in our Lipton, PG and Brooke Bond brands. During the peak production season more than 28 000 people are employed, mostly in the manual plucking of the fresh young leaf tips that go into our black leaf tea.
Whilst the high-altitude tea fields appear green and tranquil places, they can in fact become dangerous during stormy weather. The biggest safety risk our tea-pluckers encounter while working in the open fields is a fatal lightning strike. Local weather patterns and nearby mountainous areas mean that lightning storms are common. The weather changes quickly, so early warning of storms is essential to allow the undulating tea fields to be evacuated promptly. This gives people time to walk to shelter in locations that have been designated safe.
Using technology
We have been piloting a new lightning detection system to improve the safety of the employees who work on our tea estates. The pioneering system measures the electric field intensity in the atmosphere. This enables us to get a more scientific idea of when lightning storms are likely to hit.
"This creative use of technology has allowed us to view thunderstorm activity as far as 1 000km away in neighbouring countries," says Martin Ogada, Project engineer.
The ground-breaking innovation was first piloted on our Limuru tea estate in Kenya. The only lightning detection systems of its kind in East Africa, the detector was developed by an international team of Unilever engineers and local management. The team also worked closely with local experts and academics.
Reducing the risks
The lightning detection system will be rolled out to our Mufundi estate in Tanzania. It will prove especially useful to our team leaders there because an escarpment at the edge of the estate prevents them from seeing the cloud formation in full. This obstruction makes human judgements on the likelihood of lightning more prone to errors. The system is also planned for our Mabroukie and Kericho Tea Estates.
Not only are our employees now safer, but we have also seen the number of unnecessary evacuations of our estates reduce and production efficiency improve.
"These electronic storm detectors will not replace use of traditional or local knowledge, but will work alongside it to enhance our capabilities", assures Arthur Mamvura, Safety, Health, Environment and Quality Manager.
