Walking- Working Surfaces

 

This article is available in Spanish

Overview Slips, trips, and falls account for many industry accidents. Slips, trips, and falls are responsible for 10 percent of all accidental deaths. They are also the fourth leading cause, following motor vehicles, homicides, and being struck by objects or equipment, as a cause of fatalities. In an attempt to remove potential hazards from the workplace, OSHA developed 1910, Subpart D—Walking—Working Surfaces. Subpart D. Hazards involved with using walking-working surfaces The main hazard involved with walking and working surfaces include slips, trips, and falls. Stairways are also taken for granted, and so become a source for accidents in the workplace. What must my employer do? Your employer is responsible for providing a safe working environment. That includes reducing or eliminating hazards in walking and working areas by: ·         Keeping all employment, passageway, storerooms, and service rooms clean, orderly, and sanitary. ·         Maintain floors in a clean and, so far as possible, dry condition. If wet processes are used, drainage shall be maintained. Gratings, mats, or raised platforms must be provided. ·         Floors, working places, and passageways are to be kept free from protruding nails, splinters, or loose boards. ·         Keeping aisles and passageways clear and in good repair with no obstruction across or in aisles that could create hazards. ·         Appropriately marking permanent aisles and passageways. ·                   Maintaining proper aisle width so as to not limit passage or egress. ·                   Providing covers and/or guardrails to protect open pits, vats, tanks, ditches, and other hazards. ·                   Following load rating limits for all floors or roofs. ·                   Maintain adequate lighting in areas to illuminate walking surfaces. ·                   Providing handrails as required.

Pipeline Construction

 This article is also available in Spanish

If you work on a pipeline, you and your company must obey the OSHA safety and health regulations. OSHA recently visited a number of pipeline installation jobsites in a northern state. This Toolbox Talk discusses the results of those OSHA visits.

The contractor received willful and serious violations of the Occupational Safety and Health Act. The citations were for: (1) inadequately guarded trenches, (2) improper operation and maintenance of pipelaying cranes, and (3) allowing unauthorized employees to ride machinery.

All of these activities are prohibited by the OSHA regulations.

Cave-in-protection

The common hazard found at most of the worksites was the lack of adequate cave-in protection for employees working in trenches five feet or more in depth.

Twenty-five American workers died in trenching-related cave-ins in 1998.

OSHA standards require that effective collapse protection be in place and in use before you enter a trench. The absence of such protection leaves workers exposed to being struck by and buried beneath tons of soil before they have a chance to react or escape.

Other trenching and shoring violations that were observed were: (1) water accumulating in a trench, (2) a trench lacked a ladder or other means of exit every 25 feet, and (3) removed dirt piles were placed too close to the edge of excavations.

Unauthorized modifications to heavy equipment

The boom of a pipelaying crane that was pulling the equipment sled fell, struck, and killed an employee riding on the sled. OSHA cited the company for making un authorized modifications to the pipelayer and allowing employees to ride the sled.

Other equipment problems that were cited were: (1) a custom-made lifting device had not been load-tested or had its load lifting capacity marked on the device, (2) damaged crane slings were in use, and (3) a sling was not marked with its load rating.

Jobsites are complicated and busy. It takes alert supervisors and employees, ones that know the OSHA regulations, can spot hazards, and are willing to correct those hazards, to make jobsites safe.

 

 

Responsibilities and Rights as an Employee

 

This article is also available in Spanish 

Overview

OSHA is responsible for establishing rules, regulations, and practices that help keep us all safe at work. Under these rules, employees have certain rights and responsibilities in regard to workplace safety.

Responsibilities

Read the OSHA poster at the jobsite.

Comply with all applicable OSHA standards.

Follow all employer safety and health rules and regulations, and wear or use prescribed protective equipment while engaged in work.

Report hazardous conditions to your supervisor.

Report any job-related injury or illness to your employer, and seek treatment promptly.

Cooperate with the OSHA compliance officer conducting an inspection if he or she inquires about safety and health conditions in your workplace.

Exercise your rights under the Act in a responsible manner.

Rights

You have a right to seek safety and health on the job without fear of punishment. That right is spelled out in Section 11(c) of the Act.

If you are exercising these or other OSHA rights, your employer is not allowed to discriminate against you in any way, such as through firing, demotion, taking away seniority or other earned benefits, transferring you to an undesirable job or shift, or threatening or harassing you.

As an employee, you also have the right to:

·         Review copies of appropriate OSHA standards, rules, regulations and requirements that your employer should have available at the workplace.

·         Request information from your employer on safety and health hazards in the area, on precautions that may be taken, and on procedures to be followed if you are involved in an accident or exposed to toxic substances.

·         Receive adequate training and information on workplace safety and health hazards.

·         Request the OSHA area director to conduct an inspection if you believe hazardous conditions or violations of standards exist in your workplace.

·         Have your name withheld from your employer, upon request to OSHA, if you file a written and signed complaint.

·         Be advised of OSHA actions regarding your complaint and have an informal review, if requested, of any decision not to inspect or to issue a citation.

·         Have your authorized employee representative accompany the OSHA compliance officer during the inspection tour.

·         Respond to questions from the OSHA compliance officer, particularly if there is no authorized employee representative accompanying the compliance officer.

·         Observe any monitoring or measuring of hazardous materials and have the right to see these records, as specified under the Act.

·         Have your authorized representative, or yourself, review the injury and illness recordkeeping forms (OSHA Nos. 300, 301, 300A) at a reasonable time and in a reasonable manner.

·         Request a closing discussion with the compliance officer following an inspection.

·         Submit a written request to NIOSH for information on whether any substance in your workplace has potentially toxic effects in the concentration being used, and have your name withheld from your employer if you so request.

·         Object to the abatement period set in the citation issued to your employer by writing to the OSHA area director within 15 working days of the issuance of the citation.

·         Be notified by your employer if he or she applies for a variance from an OSHA standard, and testify at a variance hearing and appeal the final decision.

·         Submit information or comment to OSHA on the issuance, modification, or revocation of OSHA standards and request a public hearing.