IN the construction industry, workers are consistently operating in environments where hazards abound. Employers and employees alike rely on state-of-the-art fall protection equipment as they work on various types of structures.
IT was a normal work day for J.D. Buske. With the blink of an eye, all of that changed. He almost became one of the one thousand daily eye injury statistics reported in the United States. Here's his story: "Hello, my name is J.D., and I live in San Antonio, Texas. Today your product saved my right eye and prevented me from serious injury to my face. Let me explain what happened.
THE American Industrial Hygiene Association's president, Roy Buchan, sent a letter Aug. 22 urging OSHA's acting chief to accelerate work on a hearing conservation rule for construction workers. Buchan's letter noted AIHA had taken an active role in OSHA's consideration of this rule since May 2000.
WHAT are the biggest safety problems on summer construction sites? Noise, moving vehicles, heat, and falls from height come readily to mind. But some of the most common hazards are more subtle: Communication problems, poor housekeeping, and a wrongheaded safety approach are factors.
THE mission of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration is to assure the safety and health of America's workers by setting and enforcing standards; providing training, outreach, and education; establishing partnerships; and encouraging continual improvement in workplace safety and health.
INTERESTINGLY, it may be perfectly acceptable to wear tennis shoes while installing sheet metal weatherproofing on a steeply pitched roof. At least, that was the thrust of a May 2004 interpretation letter from the chief of OSHA's Construction Directorate.
THE biggest electrical threat to workers is no secret: Power lines, especially overhead power lines, are Public Enemy Number One. Contact with power lines is killing about 133 American workers each year--mostly but not entirely in the construction industry, with victims working mostly but not entirely for small businesses, said Michael G. Clendenin, executive director of the Electrical Safety Foundation International in Rosslyn, Va.
PRIME paving season is here for much of the United States, causing highway work zones to sprout and renewing efforts to spread the gospel of safety to workers and motorists alike.
THE hard hat has become the symbol of the construction industry. With this widely supported "branding" of construction as a safety-conscious industry came substantive reductions in injuries and illnesses--a 47 percent reduction, from 15.3 per hundred full-time construction workers in 1976 to 7.9 in 2001, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
IT'S a good idea to monitor OSHA's Standard Interpretations site on a regular basis. You can easily find the site by clicking on the "interpretations" link right from OSHA's www.osha.gov homepage.
FALLS have long been the bane of construction work in this country. Last fall, the third edition of "The Construction Chart Book" from the Center to Protect Workers' Rights pinpointed falls as the leading cause of death for two construction occupations in 1999.
AFTER a long period of dormancy, federal OSHA has picked up activity in the area of hearing loss prevention rulemaking. Activity is focused in the areas of recordkeeping and hearing conservation in construction.
The Miami-based company faces a proposed $258,935 in penalties.