OSHA watch

Injury tracking application restored

The application launched on Aug. 1, as part of the compliance effort for its controversial electronic record-keeping rule, but a note on the website two weeks later said technical difficulties were making some of the ITA pages unavailable. A technology scan confirmed that there was no security breach and the application was restored.

Comments sought on lockout/tagout

The agency plans to issue a request for information in April 2018 regarding potential updates to its lockout/tagout standard, a frequently cited violation that is increasingly deemed out of date. There has been an increase in the variance requests because advances in technology that incorporate computer-based control of hazardous energy are increasingly used in machines and can conflict with the existing lockout/tagout standard.

Employer faces over $1 million in fines, including first walking-working surfaces violations

Shortly after the requirements under new Subpart D, "Walking-Working Surfaces (WWS)," became effective, Aluminum Shapes LLC of New Jersey Camden County was inspected and cited for 51 safety and health violations with proposed penalties of $1,922,895. Among the citations were fixed ladders, portable ladders, skylights, stairs, loading docks, and other walking-working surfaces that were not compliant. One violation for failure to ensure that the side rails of a ladder extended 42 inches above the top of the access level or landing platform served by the ladder resulted in a proposed penalty of $9,959.

Website changes

• Data on workplace fatalities removed from home page, continuing shift away from policy of public shaming
• The publication webpage is now formatted for all devices and has been reorganized
• More employer stories added to heat protection pages

Trench safety symposium webinar available online

Conducted in conjunction with the National Utility Contractors Association, and the University of Texas at Arlington, the symposium focused on ways to prevent trenching and excavation hazards in the construction industry.

Safety training videos for tobacco farm workers

The North Carolina Department of Labor's Agriculture Safety and Health Bureau, the Farm Labor Practices Group, NC State University and industry stakeholders collaborated to produce safety training videos addressing agricultural safety and health hazards faced by tobacco farm workers.

Enforcement notes

California

• Crenshaw Manufacturing Inc. in Huntington Beach received six citations and $142,715 in penalties after a worker had three fingers amputated while manually loading products into an operating punch press. Fines relate to machine guarding, failure to conduct regular inspections, and lack of training.
• Santa Ana-based Triumph Processing- Embee Division, Inc. plant, manufacturer of aircraft parts, received a total of 23 citations, totaling proposed fines of $87,500 for exposing workers to the dangerous chemical hexavalent chromium (chromium-6), and not notifying workers that they knew or try to protect workers from exposure.

Florida

• Jacksonville-based Great White Construction Inc., a roofing contractor, faces penalties of more than $1.5 million for 14 workplace safety violations and has been placed in the Severe Violator Enforcement Program due to high-gravity, willful, egregious violations related to fall hazards.
• An administrative law judge has vacated two citations issued against Riverview-based Central Site Development L.L.C. involving a fatality of a worker of a subcontractor. The company had received two citations under the general duty clause, but the judge found the multiemployer worksite doctrine does not apply to citations issued under the general duty clause.

Massachusetts

• UHS of Westwood Pembroke, Inc. - doing business as Lowell Treatment Center, a behavioral health facility, faces $207,690 in proposed penalties for failure to abate violations involving workplace violence.
• An administrative law judge upheld citations and $4,000 in penalties assessed against a contractor, Chris Welch, for failing to provide fall protection and appropriate ladders for his workers who were working on a roof of a house in Springfield.
• An administrative law judge has affirmed citations and proposed fines issued against a roofing contractor, William Trahant Jr. Construction Inc. in Lynn, who failed to show at his scheduled commission hearing. Penalties are $43,560 for failure to provide fall protection or hard hats.

New York

• Carthage Specialty Paperboard is facing $357,445 in proposed penalties for more than 60 safety and health hazards, including more than 20 instances of machinery lacking safety guards to prevent possible amputation.

Pennsylvania

• An administrative law judge upheld citations against Montgomeryville-based Lloyd Industries Inc.'s facility after a worker's three fingers were amputated when a machine without safety guards crushed his hand. Proposed total penalties are $822,000.

Wisconsin

• Marshfield-based Felker Brothers Corp., a manufacturer of steel pipes and tubes is facing $110,458 in proposed fines after a worker was struck by a machinery part and suffered a shattered jaw and concussion, a worker was exposed to hexavalent chromium at levels 1.8% higher than the permissible exposure limit and other violations.