OSHA

I am citing from safety schooling I took in the nineties. It changes with the wind, so today it is probably different.

Steve

OSHA .... just another wart on the asshole of progress.

JLZ

Snipping occured

In the 12 years working there, there have been three injuries requiring ER visits. No one has had to stay in the hospital. Stitches were the only thing required.

Those Minds

I just don't know to be honest. Something in the back of my mind just won't accept it. I might accept copper for a home shop but I've had to repair too many black pipes from abuse to think copper would ever do. In the back of my mind, I think that the black pipe helps support the roof! At least I know about my blinders and hired Roger as a consultant just to "look" at things with new eye balls.

Good enough for me, Tom. I think all of us have things that we believe in, and things we don't. I thought maybe in this case you knew something that had gotten past me.

Thanks,

Harold

Ahh, that explains how to exit the building when he can't read the exit signs!

Jon

In the training by OSHA reps that I have had, there are at least two kinds of Osha officers. Training officers, which he was, and compliance officers, who carry badges. He said if you stall a compliance officer longer than 15 minutes or so in the lobby, he will leave and come back with a deputy and a warrant to enter the premises. If they are there to examine your air compressors, for example, you can leave the lobby and go around the outside of the building to show them to the officer. If you go through the building, or pass anything that catches his eye, he is required to address infractions as he sees them. Apparently, they do not always do generalized inspections. In the installation of a new roof on the factory, an officer showed up at the base of the ladder and wanted to talk to the roofing contractor about his lack of perimeter roping. I was on the roof. He was not interested in any other functions going on relative to the factory itself. The inspector told them that a rival roofing contractor told him about it, and physically lead him to the jobsite. Ain't that chickenshit? The training officer also told us that a backhoe working in sight of the highway was an OSHA MAGNET. Personal cave-in protection for the pit worker must often go lacking.

RJ

Once had a Cal Osha guy show up at our sign shop and start looking for violations. Only thing he could find was a few loose lids on LATEX paint cans. He said they were emitting volatile organic compounds. I told him that made no sense at all because as soon as I apply the paint to those sign blanks it is going to emit exactly all of the VOCs so am I not able to paint anything again? He gave me a blank stare like he I had just asked him a trick question and just left the building.

See? You guys were TOO safe so the inspector had to invent more hoops for you to jump through to justify his existence. And we wonder why companies pull up stakes and move to China.

Rob

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Rob Skinner La Habra, California

If there was no two-night stay then those events would not automatically trigger an osha investigation, according to the rules as I understand them.

Jim

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We may be referring to different entities. I am in Oregon, under the perview of OR-OSHA. My understanding (and I may be wong) is that the individual states comply with the Fed's regulations and add more at will but may not subtract. I have'nt heard of a provision of a minimum hospital stay before they can show up.

Those Minds

The comments I made were specifically referenced to NY. My suspicion is that a) NY has some of the more liberal approaches to this stuff, and that b) OSHA, being a federal agency, probably has its rules standardized across the states.

Again, the comment was that the two night hospital stay was what was required before they were *required* by their own internal osha regulations to appear and inspect the worksite. That or a death. I think there's always the chance they might do so for a lesser event - thought given the state of OSHA funding right now this is highly unlikely.

Jim

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A law was recently passed in Canada (bill C-45) that if a co-worker is injured and you knew about the safety infraction and didn't do anything, you can be held criminally liable. Granted, hard to nail someone for that, but...

In the two shops I currently work in, you wear safety glasses and safety boots 100% of the time. If you don't have them or won't wear them, you go home or you're fired.

Regards,

Robin

And if you go blind, they send you home, too. ;-)

Steve

"Backlash" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@portbridge.com:

Just had a man killed locally Friday in a trench cave-in. Another man in the ditch survived, but with a dislocated leg and other injuries. It took 5 hours to get the survivor out. Installing a sewer line, and I bet there was no cage in the ditch either, although the paper never said one way or another.

That's a very good program and it even makes sense. What was the last time any thing the government did make any sense?

You are absolutely right about what happens after an accident. It can cost millions. Not only will the company get sued; OSHA will come in and put some heavy fines on the company. I don't know how it works but every time there is an accident OHSA is informed and they swoop down on the company looking for any violation. My local scrap dealer had an employee that lost his arm in a scrap shredder. It cost him a fortune. The only good to come out of it was that the scrap dealer was a complete A-hole and it was great to see someone stick it to him. The bad thing that came out of it, besides the guy losing his arm, is that all my local scrap dealers are now paranoid about being sued and they won't let anyone in to pick through the scrap piles looking for good stuff. One of my great pleasures in life is taking a piece of junk and doing something useful with it.

Scp