aluminium company fined for safety violations....

 

Government safety organizations were established to ensure safe and healthful working conditions for workers by setting and enforcing standards and by providing training, outreach, education and assistance. Companies who fail to follow the safety standards can be cited, monetary fines can be awarded, and in some cases company managers can be personally liable. Here is a recent story emphasizing the role that government safety organizations play.

 

(Company name omitted) will affirm a $1 million penalty and accept 10 willful, 15 repeat and 55 serious violations and one other-than-serious citation in a settlement agreement to resolve two long-running U.S. Department of Labor Occupational Safety and Health Administration cases related to a fatality and a series of employee injuries at the company’s plant (in the USA).

 

The company also agreed to implement enhanced abatement measures, including developing a comprehensive safety and health plan, retaining a full-time safety professional with demonstrated experience in lockout/tagout and confined space compliance, and implementing additional employee training.

 

“While this settlement can never reverse the senseless loss of life and serious injuries that occurred, it goes a long way in ensuring employer accountability and providing key worker protections to prevent future incidents,” said Regional Solicitor of Labor (name omitted). “The agreement further demonstrates the U.S. Department of Labor’s commitment to pursue every available opportunity to enforce workplace safety laws.”

 

Trial attorneys from the Regional Office of the Solicitor in (state name omitted).

Under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, employers are responsible for providing safe and healthful workplaces for their employees. OSHA’s role is to ensure these conditions for America’s workers by setting and enforcing standards, and providing training, education and assistance. Learn more about OSHA.

The Aluminium Plant Safety Blog offers our sincere condolences on the deceased worker that began the process of the company being cited and fined. We acknowledge that nothing will bring back the deceased worker to their family. We hope that this recent legal action may bring a sense of closure. We pray that the worker’s family remember their loved one as they lived and not as they died. We know that is easier said then done but that is our sincere hope.

It should not come to surprise to the reader that we are quite familiar with this company. We have visited the company, spoke to every worker and toured every department. Many of our safety observations were cited by OSHA as being repeat issues. In other words, they company was made aware of the issues and for unknown reasons the issues were present when OSHA inspected the workplace at a later date. That results in stiffer monetary penalties.

The definition of the various violations are as follows:

WILLFUL: A willful violation is defined as a violation in which the employer either knowingly failed to comply with a legal requirement (purposeful disregard) or acted with plain indifference to employee safety.

SERIOUS: A serious violation exists when the workplace hazard could cause an accident or illness that would most likely result in death or serious physical harm, unless the employer did not know or could not have known of the violation.

REPEATED: A Federal agency may be cited for a repeated violation if the agency has been cited previously for the same or a substantially similar condition and, for a serious violation, OSHA's regionwide (see last page) inspection history for the agency lists a previous OSHA Notice issued within the past five years; or, for an other-than-serious violation, the establishment being inspected received a previous OSHA Notice issued within the past five years.

OTHER-THAN-SERIOUS: A violation that has a direct relationship to job safety and health, but is not serious in nature, is classified as "other-than-serious."

In the legal settlement between the aluminium company and OSHA there was this statement that the aluminium company needs to do "Hiring a full time safety professional with demonstrated experience in ensuring compliance with OSHA's Lockout/Tagout and Permit Required Confined Space standards" We assume that the aluminium company at that moment of settlement agreement did not have a safety officer in place. If it was us we would look for an individual with lots of experience and provide them with a good salary and provide that individual with one or two assistants. Assistants !? We recommend that because the settlement states numerous areas in safety management are either missing or inadequate in terms of compliance to OSHA standards. One individual no matter how good they are will have a difficult time performing their daily duties involving a large workplace (when we were there was nearly 400 workers) and author all that is needed to fulfill the settlement with OSHA. The last thing this company wants nor needs if for them to hire a qualified safety professional who becomes burned out and quits before all the plans, procedures, and documents are completed as required by the settlement agreement. 

We have a myriad of prayers for this aluminium company and their workers. The workers we met were all good people who took pride in their work. Many had been employed for over thirty years. We spoke to every department around the clock over several days. As with every plant visit we do not forget the faces nor their stories. The editors of the Aluminium Plant Safety Blog have a special place in our hearts for this workplace and will reach out and see we can assist. Wish us luck.  

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