The objectives of the present study were to quantify the dermal exposure (DE) and respiratory exposures (RE) of the driver and driver's assistant of an airboat during herbicide application for aquatic weed management, to classify these working conditions as safe or unsafe, and to calculate the need for exposure control and the time of safe working. The airboat had an aluminum hull (4.85 x 2.42 m) with a propeller coupled to a 350 HP gasoline engine. The spraying equipment consisted of a diaphragm pump with a maximum flow rate of 49.69 L min-1 and a maximum pressure of 25 kg cm-2 driven by a 4 HP gasoline engine, a 189 L spraying tank, and an aluminum spray boom divided into two 3 m lateral sections positioned between the back of the driver's seat and the extremity of the protective structure of the propeller. Each boom section contained six AI 100 03 air induction flat spray nozzles spaced 0.5 m apart and an OC 20 nozzle fixed to each end of the boom. The set of nozzles was adjusted to cover a width of 6 m, and application volume of 200 L spray ha-1. An electronic flow control system coupled to a DGPS (with submetric precision) was used to automatically correct the flow rate as a function of alterations of the true speed of the boat. Herbicide exposure had been calculated with the substitute data of the exposures to sprays, evaluated with the tracers copper (DE) and manganese (RE) added to the sprays. Exposure was extrapolated to a work day of 6 hours. Working condition safety was determined by calculating the margin of safety (MOS) using the formula MOS = (NOEL x 70) / AEQ x 10, where AEQ= absorved exposure quantity. The working conditions exposed the driver to 10.65 mL spray day-1 and the driver's assistant, who sits on a chair 2.0 m in front of the driver and the spray boom, to 16.80 mL day-1. Application of glyphosate (Rodeo, 6 L ha-1), 2,4-D (DMA 806 BR, 8 L ha-1) and fluridone (Sonar AQ, 0.4 L ha-1) was classified as safe (MS > 1) for the driver and driver's assistant. The application of diquat (Reward, 4.0 L ha¹) was classified as unsafe (MS < 1) both for the two working conditions, with the calculated need for exposure control being 65% for the driver and 78% for the driver's assistant.
chemical control; aquatic weed; intoxication risk; work safety
