Occupational health studies on airport transport workers. II. Muscle strength of airport transport workers.

Airport transport workers do manual work in loading and unloading the cargo space of passenger airplanes. In several types of airplanes the work has to be carried out in narrow spaces and in cramped positions. The present study describes the isometric strength of some muscle groups in 70 airport transport workers. Trunk extensors, trunk flexors, muscles involved in bimanual vertical lifting, elbow extensors, and elbow flexors were measured. A method with fixed positions and strictly isometric contractions was used. The strengths of the different muscle groups correlated with each other and with body weight; those of lifting, trunk flexors and biceps also with stature. The absolute strength of the muscle groups declined with advancing age at rates from 0.3% to 1.5% per year, the relative strength (N/kg body weight) by 0.9%-2.0% per year.