OSHA Reveals Top 10 Most Cited Violations Today
It has become a popular tradition at NSC's annual Congress for an OSHA representative to sit down with an editor of the council's publication, Safety + Health, to reveal and then discuss the year's "Top 10" violations of the agency's standards. That happens in a live presentation today at 10 a.m. on the Expo floor at booth 1886.
Typically, the categories cited are familiar territory to anyone who keeps track of such things. But even among citation watchers, there remains some anticipation--and sometimes surprise--about the order in which the categories finish in a given year. It happened last year when Scaffolding overtook HazCom for the number one, most-often-violated slot. In general, ladder violations have been going up the last three years. And you can never overestimate Machine Guarding (last year's number eight finisher), because OSHA specifically checks for violations in that category during an inspection. The biggest issue for Powered Industrial Trucks (which came in sixth place last year) is lack of training. It remains to be seen how OSHA's new directive for Lockout-Tagout (fifth place last year) might affect its standing for 2007.
The biggest issues in Hazard Communication--which with 6,704 citations was last year's second-place finisher--include a lack of written programs, MSDSs, and training. As it does for Machine Guarding, OSHA checks for HazCom violations at every inspection. Scaffolding, of course, remains a major focus area for the agency; with 9,012 citations, it handily "won" the '06 competition. Fall Protection, Respiratory Protection, Electrical Wiring, and Electrical General rounded out the top 10 last year and will very likely be in contention in today's presentation.