After Recyc-Mattress Corp, an East Hartford, Connecticut mattress recycling company, failed to provide OSHA with information that it had remedied all the hazards cited in a 2015 inspection, the agency began an inspection on Jan. 12, 2016, to verify correction of the hazards.
An employee of Nidi Tec Inc. in Denver, Colorado died on January 29, 2016 after approximately 6,500 pounds of granite slabs fell on him. The incident occurred as the worker was setting slabs on an “A” frame rack with a fork truck.
Employees of a Louisiana firing range were exposed to lead from spent ammunition rounds – a health and safety hazard which helped earn the company citations for 16 serious violations from OSHA.
A Passaic, New Jersey warehouse operator was cited earlier this month for two dozen safety violations, including failure to have a written hazard assessment and a hazard communication program (including material safety data sheets), a lack of training for employees required to handle hazardous chemicals, fall hazards, inadequate exit signage, lack of machine guarding, electrical hazards, and a failure to provide eyewash facilities.
Q: Is there a limit to the number of precautionary statements that appear on the label?
A: No. OSHA requires all of the appropriate precautionary statements to appear on the label to warn users of the hazards of the chemical in question.
Industrial end users – from plant, operations, and maintenance managers to janitorial and sanitation supervisors to environmental health and safety (EHS) compliance officers – must now ask if their chemical labels are GHS compliant.
Among the industries affected by the revisions in OSHA’s Hazard Communication Standard (HCS) is the restaurant industry, where workers may be exposed to an array of potentially hazardous chemicals such as oven cleaners, floor cleaners, pesticides, disinfectants, drain cleaners, soaps, detergents, and latex. These materials can cause everything from infections to severe burns.
The June 1, 2016 deadline past; employers must be in compliance with OSHA’s GHS standard through the updating of alternative workplace labeling and hazard communication program (as necessary), and by providing additional employee training for newly identified physical or health hazards.
Dear Mr. Jones:
This letter is to follow up on the interim letter sent to you dated June 24, 2014, by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). In your original April 1, 2014, letter you requested clarification on whether railroad train crews performing work as hazmat employees are subject to the OSHA Hazard Communication Standard, 29 C.F.R. § 1910.1200.
Under OSHA’s revision of the Hazard Communication Standard, 29 CFR 1910.1200 (HCS), information about chemical hazards be conveyed on labels using quick visual notations to alert the user, providing immediate recognition of the hazards.