NIOSH FACE Twitter Launch Highlights Crane Hazards
Three of the fatality reports posted on the new page concern the deaths of crane riggers. One of the live presentations in the OH&S Aug. 31 virtual event will discuss common errors that lead to such accidents.
NIOSH's FACE program, a research program designed to identify and study fatal occupational injuries, has launched its own Twitter page. Three of the fatality investigation reports posted there initially (here, here, and here) involve crane rigger fatalities, and this problem is one of the topics to be addressed Aug. 31 during the OH&S virtual event.
NIOSH FACE began in 1982. Participating states voluntarily notify NIOSH of traumatic occupational fatalities that resulted from targeted causes of death. These have included confined spaces, electrocutions, machine-related fatalities, falls from height, and logging. NIOSH FACE is currently targeting investigations of deaths associated with machinery, deaths of foreign-born workers, energy production, and construction falls.
State FACE began in 1989 and currently has nine state health or labor departments working with NIOSH through cooperative agreements to conduct surveillance, target investigations, and carry out prevention activities at the state level using the FACE model. In addition to the NIOSH targets, states investigate fatalities related to state-level targets. State FACE investigations have included fatalities related to renewable energy, logging, agriculture, transportation, commercial aviation and fishing, suicides, homicides, worker deaths involving toxicological issues, semi-truck and dump truck fatalities, public sector workers, incidents involving multiple workers, chemical-related fatalities, young workers under 25 years of age, older workers over 60, asthma-related deaths, temporary workers and volunteers, and tree trimmers.
The NIOSH program gives users access to the full text of hundreds of fatality investigation reports and background on the program itself.