Tips & Updates about OSHA & Hazwoper Training Courses | Safety Tips

The new Broadway musical, Spiderman: Turn off the Dark looks like it is going to meet a dark fate after its matinee and evening performances were canceled due to technical problems. The show, directed by Julie Taymor and music by Bono and Edge of U2, has been plagued with a lot of problems right from the very beginning. When the show gave its first preview performance in late November, the harnesses and the rigging gave a lot of trouble. The woman, who played spider, was left dangling in air for around eight minutes. Next, Spiderman himself faced trouble while he was climbing down the harness. When the press looked into the matter, it was found that loose wires were left hanging and a whole part of the set was completely missing. After that performance, several injuries were reported in the consecutive performances. On the 20th of December, Christopher Tierney, the dancer-cum-stuntman for Spiderman, fell from a platform that was approximately 30 feet above the audience. This happened a...

After the death of a maintenance worker, which resulted after a refrigerator, fell on him from a fourth story apartment, OSHA has begun to investigate the incident. The man died while working on a project and was an employee for the building’s owner, Milwaukee-based Wiegand Enterprises LLC. The 33 year old man was a part of a renovating crew working on an apartment and was struck by a refrigerator thrown by his co workers from the building. According to a police officer, four maintenance workers were disposing debris from the building. They were tossing few items over the west end balcony of the building. The staff called out ‘all clear’ before the refrigerator was tossed over the balcony edge. However, the victim had just walked beneath the falling refrigerator and was crushed to his death. It was a very tragic accident as he died on the spot. OSHA is investigating the scene and it is still too early to say whether the accident could lead to any citations. OSHA is quite notorious when...

Six days ago, Lee County faced a disastrous gas main rupture, fire and explosion. TECO gas blamed Posen Construction for the cause of the unfortunate incident. However, the latter has still not issued a comment on the situation stating what happened and why. At the same time, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, OSHA, in Tampa has confirmed that the situation is being thoroughly investigated. The fines for willful violations can go up to seventy thousand dollars, says the assistant director of the OSHA office. He also said that the serious violations can draw fines of up to seven thousand. Those who are repeatedly fined for the same violation can be fined up to ten times the original penalty. OSHA is supposed to issue a citation or find a violation well within the first six months of the incident. OSHA has not confirmed how long the investigation might last. TECO gas says it isn't its liability to pay for the losses of those customers who didn't have natural gas. ...

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration(OSHA), a federal agency, recently announced that it would be fining the Porter Road paper mill $75,000, for even after the death of a worker on May 12th, the follow up investigation found, “repeat and serious violations” of workplace safety regulations. Peter Q. Neville, was killed at the Norampac Industries, which is a container board plant. He was crushed between a 5,000-pound roll of paper that was moving on a conveyor belt and a metal wall. His wife Mara, has contacted a lawyer and hence, is now speaking out about the importance of workplace safety. She even wants to let others know, what a wonderful father and husband he was. OSHA had inspected the Norampac plant after the accident. OSHA’s area director in Buffalo, Arthur Dube, said that, “Our inspections found that the area where the moving paper roll and the barrier intersected lacked guarding to prevent employees from being caught between the two objects,” he further went on to ...

OSHA is a body in the U.S Department of Labor. This regulatory body was established under the OSHA Act, by the Congress of the United States. On the 29th of December 1970, this Act was signed by President Richard M. Nixon. From its initiation, OSHA has consistently and constantly been on a mission to reduce and eliminate work place health and safety issues, mishaps and fatalities, by enforcing certain safety guidelines, standards and procedures. Recently, OSHA took one more leap forward by opening a new office in Phoenix. Initially, it was controlled and managed from a regional office in San Francisco. Today, OSHA has taken yet another step forward by opening another new office in Honolulu. Indeed! OSHA has started expanding its presence. This new Honolulu office will now be able to provide more enforcement in the islands. OSHA's regional administrator in San Francisco, Ken Nishiyama Atha, said that, "With the new area office in Honolulu, we will improve service to workers and...

The contractor that has been conducting the sanitary sewer project in Reading Township, need fret no more, for he has been given a clean bill of safety and health from the U.S, Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). The director for OSHA's North Aurora area office, Kathy Webb, announced that, the OSHA inspectors could find no safety violations with regards to this particular project. She even said that, “Whenever we do a trench inspection, we check for everything. She even told the Times that, “"When we go out to a site, we observe what we see on the day of the inspection. If someone sends us a photograph, we can't use those. We use what we see." But it is also important to note that, Webb said that, she would forward those findings to the Peoria office for future inspections. According to Kathy Webb, the OSHA investigators found construction workers lowering boring sheets and sewer pumps in to a boring containment. After the boring sheets and pump were...

The U.S. OSHA, has finally announced, that it has penalized SeaWorld for committing serious safety violations. This devastating blow has come, just months after, marine mammal trainer Dawn Brancheau was killed in an incident, involving a 12,000-pound orca named Tilikum. More specifically, OSHA, has found 3 safety violations, that are now being categorized as “willful”, for primarily failing to protect employees from, struck-by and drowning hazards. The first “serious citation” was for failing to install a stairway railing system, where as the other “lesser- than serious citation” was, for failing to place, weatherproof enclosures over outdoor electrical outlets in the stadium. Overall, SeaWorld, has been slapped with a total fine of $75,000. With regards to these safety violations, SeaWorld stated that those findings were “enfounded”. They further,went on to say that,"OSHA's allegations in this citation are unsupported by any evidence or precedent and reflect a fundamental l...

It seems the O’Donnell parking structure is seeing its last days when OSHA shut it down after a partial wall collapsed killing one person and injured two more. Some of the visitors who have parked their cars prior to the incident will be unable to retrieve their cars for days since it has been completely closed down. The county officials had received a call shortly after 4 p.m. informing them that a 30-foot slab of concrete collapsed onto a driveway below. The incident happened on the park east facade and the concrete trapped at least one person inside and two others were injured in the collapse. The cause of the collapse has not been disclosed yet, but the city engineers were being summoned to the scene to determine the integrity of the parking structure. Some motorists were still allowed to retrieve their vehicles from the south section of the parking structure. When OSHA took over the matter, they gave a nod to close down the whole structure completely. It seems the investigation wi...

BP seems to be in the limelight these days, but under a negative light. With people becoming more interest in them, some horrible secrets have come ashore. BP has been fined by OSHA 760 times, in complete contrast to the oil giant ExxonMobil (XOM) that has been fined only once. The question is, with all these citations, how did OSHA allow BP to operate? Before, we were unaware of these skeletons in the closet but now, BP or OSHA has an explanation to give. Let us take a look back into the past and browse through the track record of BP’s safety violations: In 2007, 200,000 gallons of crude oil were spilled into the Alaskan wilderness and BP got hit with $16 million in fines. Approximately $353 million was paid to the Justice Department as part of an agreement to hold prosecution on charges that BP contrived to manipulate the propane gas market. Prior to Deepwater Horizon, 30 BP workers were killed in two separate disasters and more than 200 were seriously injured. In the last three year...

OSHA is circulating several safety guides as well as fact sheets in numerous languages to the workers involved in the oil spill clean up along with the Gulf Coast. Before any workers could be hired to engage in the clean up, OSHA requires the workers to receive the material supplement. Apart from English, the safety guides and fact sheets will be initially printed in Vietnamese and Spanish since there’s a diverse population inhabiting the Gulf Coast region. The safety materials will be made available by BP’s education contractor, PEC, as well as OSHA officials at the cleanup staging areas. Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis has urged BP to employ some local workers displaced by the oil spill, though many of them have limited English proficiency. Solis has said that she has directed OSHA to work close with BP in order ensure OSHA safety training of cleanup employees. The OSHA safety training must be thorough, prompt and adequate, and must be conducted in those languages that the workers ...

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration(OSHA) has fined a Montana company $7,000 after a worker faced death from injuries sustained while he was working for a seismograph crew near the Beach. On 5th March, about three miles north of Beach, Christopher Whalen, 22, of Havre, Mont., was doing seismographic drilling operations for Erickson Contract Surveying, Inc. when he was injured badly after a 250-pound steel pipe fell on his head. As a driller with his assistant were pulling pipe out of a hole on a rig, the 20-foot section of pipe was placed on the “beaver slide” and the fast plug failed or the pipe released, and that caused the steel pipe to strike Whalen in the head, according to OSHA documents. On May 5, OSHA had issued two citations. The first one was for $3,500, cites Erickson Contract for not providing a place of employment free from recognized hazards that may likely to cause serious harm or death. The second citation was of $3,500 was due to a lack of ensuring each a...

OSHA (U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration) has proposed penalties $45,775 and cited Okeelanta Corp. in South Bay, Fla for repeated and serious violations of OSHA rules. The cited company has exposed workers to lacerations and amputation injuries. OSHA's Site-Specific Targeting Program incited the inspection done that payed more attention in social control efforts on comprehensive safety inspections where the highest rates of injuries and illnesses occur. The inspection found that Okeelanta has repeated violation that done before also. For this repeated violation, OSHA has proposed penalty of $12,500. The inspection has disclosed the violation includes failing to enclose sprocket wheels and chains on the specific machinery and also exposing employees to rotating parts and pinch points. If an employer previously was cited for the same violation of any regulation, standard, rule or order in federal enforcement states during the last three year...

There are options in taking the OSHA safety training courses as you can get both online and on site courses. Though it depends on you, online OSHA training has more demand as it offers more advantages. This OSHA safety training is designed to help workers at working place so that they can recognize, reduce and eliminate hazards that are associated with their work. OSHA has made OSHA training courses compulsory for all workers and approved the online courses. But on the web you will find both OSHA approved and unapproved online OSHA training providers, and you must be careful about it and select the approved one. Some advantages of online trainings are: Online OSHA training is more affordable and also saves money many ways. You will not have to travel anywhere to attend the traditional classroom teaching. You can complete the online courses at the comfort of your home or even at your office. There is no need take leave to attend these courses. Online OSHA training can save your time an...

Employees have the right to file complaints about workplace safety and health hazards. This right was given to them by the OSHA act of 1970 and they take any complaint by the workers very seriously. One more opportunity here is that if the workers want not to reveal their name, OSHA will not reveal it to the employers. There are many options that you can adopt to file a complaint if you are experienced with some issues of safety and health. Now, there is the the great opportunity to file a complaint online if you recognize that the working site is lacking in safety and health matters and there is fear of danger. Then OSHA will take action and try to resolve the problem informally with the specific employer over phone. The result of online complain comes earlier than the written one. You will have to submit written or signed complaints to OSHA Area or State Plan offices that results on site OSHA inspections. But if you want more confidentiality, you better should make a complaint from...

Online safety training can help the workers a lot for it is convenience for them and nothing is left what OSHA standards require for the training. Can you take out time in your busy schedule for a training that takes 10 to 30 hours to complete? Life is really hectic these days and sitting for a classroom for a long period makes any people bore and also the feeling of guilty as it is time consuming. The importance of OSHA safety training can not be ignored even if the training is done in a classroom. But with the advanced technologies and the availability of Internet facility now no need to worry about the classroom safety training that has significant importance to improve the safety and health of the workers at working place. With comfort and at your pace, you can complete the training from home only. Do you think you can not communicate with the experts while taking the online safety training course? Obviously you can. You can communicate with the experts within a second and can ask...

You may think how OSHA chooses a company for inspection is a big obscurity. But you can easily find out how they select a target for their rigorous or sometime a friendly inspection. One big fact is that a company can come under the scanner of OSHA if the injury rate is higher than their industrial average. So, it is a good time to benchmark your company’s injury rates now. The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases Workplace Injuries and Illnesses reports annually. The report contains the total OSHA recordable and DART rates by industry. It is also good if you could know the industries with the highest average DART rates. OSHA frequently focuses on those industries along with National Emphasis Programs. Some of the industries with the largest DART rates are: • Wood product manufacturing, 4.1 • Primary metal manufacturing, 4.3 • Food manufacturing, 4.4 • Beverage and tobacco product manufacturing, 5.0 • Nursing and residential care facilities, 5.2 • Warehousing and stora...

A lot of debates have been buzzing around for a while whether the OSHA safety training should be taken online or onsite. Those who favor the onsite training would say onsite training would be better as that would give you a live or face to face training with the expert instructors. And those who are in favor of the online training would say online OSHA safety training gives more benefit than the onsite training. There is no satisfying answer whether onsite or online OSHA training is better but it depends on you. The onsite and online OSHA safety training has been designed for the convenience of the trainees. People have different requirements and outlook. Some may be comfortable with a real instructor or in a classroom teaching. So they are more contented with the onsite training. With the help of the onsite instructor they can have a better understanding of the whole training. The online OSHA training program has been designed for people who want to schedule their own training. With o...

Dakota Dunes, Iowa- According to the authorities the worker who died in a accident at construction site in Dakota Dunes, South Dakota on Tuesday morning is from Sioux Falls. The Union County sheriff says Gabe Koenigsfeld; 27 year old was a part of the crew digging a basement on Tuesday morning when a part of the wall collapsed. He was buried under sand and dirt. Despite of the quick efforts put to dig him out, he was pronounced dead at a Sioux City hospital. The worker worked for the JJ construction, in Tea. He was an outstanding at sports at Rudd-Rockford- Marble Rock High School in Iowa, and was former football player in South Dakota State. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration spokesperson says that they did have a compliance officer at the site on Wednesday. The first task is to ensure that no one else is exposed to the hazards at the site says OSHA. The officer will check if the work site was in compliance with trenching and excavating standards interview the employees...

It’s a duty of an employer of a company not to follow OSHA standards, its rules and regulations, but also to understand it as well. Today there are some organizations where several programs are organized, specially meant to educate youngsters about the organizational health safety and help them finding jobs. It has been continuously a center point in every industry that hazardous accidents are taking place due to lack of people’s knowledge about safety. When talking about teenagers, it is found out that all kind of industries are unsafe for them and lots of training is to be provided to them to avoid such accidental injuries. It is not that employers are unaware about the efficiency of health and safety training for youngsters, but they are lacking behind to aid them with a proper training due to the reason they do not want to invest their time, and money to educate their employees who work with them. Industries specially Construction Industry and Agriculture Industry are the most trea...

Springfield, Mo. - The U.S Department of Labor’s OSHA has cited seven alleged willful and three alleged serious violation to Loren Cook Co. after a worker was killed by an ejected machine part on May 13. “Loren Cook Co. willfully allowed employees to work on dangerous equipment without safeguarding the machinery and exposed workers to debris ejected while operating manual spinning lathes,” was said by Jordan Barab, an acting Assistant Secretary of OSHA. “It is compulsory that employer take steps to eliminate hazards and provide a safe working environment.” Seven willful citations at $70,000 each proposed for failing to guard seven manual spinning lathes, with a proposed penalty of $490,000. A willful violation is issued by OSHA when an employer exhibits plain indifference to or any intentional disregard for employee’s safety and health. Total of $21,000for three serious citations with penalties are proposed for absence of adequate personal protective equipment for worker’s face, hands ...