A recent spate of construction deaths in the U.S. illustrate the dangers faced by workers in the industry – in a variety of circumstances.
A fall from a highway killed a worker in Harris County, Texas June 21. News reports say the man, a subcontractor with Choctaw Construction who was from Mexico, fell to his death at the Highway 288 expansion project being developed by Blue Ridge Transportation.
Falls from an elevation are a leading cause of death amongst contraction workers, and one third of those falls are from ladders. However, some of these fatalities could be prevented simply with the implementation of the three-point control technique.
A CBS policy change angers safety advocates; the final frontier is the target of government regulations and a mining safety rule change gets reversed in court. These were among the top stories featured on ISHN.com this week.
California OSHA issued four citations and $68,438 in penalties to USF Reddaway Inc. after a worker was fatally struck by a tractor at a truck terminal. Inspectors found that the company failed to ensure operators were competent to operate terminal tractors and did not implement traffic controls. Visit OSHA's website for information on trucking industry safety.
Trucking can be a hazardous profession for drivers – and that’s before the driver has even set foot in the cab or put the vehicle in gear. For good reason -- fleets focus much of their attention on minimizing risks on the road, but there are also risks when a driver is on his or her feet as well, due to the risk of a fall.
Work being done to prepare for the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo is raising concerns about worker safety. A report entitled, “The Dark Side of the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics,” published last month by the Building and Wood Workers’ International (BWI) union, claims that laborers – many of them foreign workers – are being overworked and discouraged from reporting poor employment conditions.
A Maine contractor who was indicted on manslaughter charges after the death of an employee – his own half-brother – maintains that he is not culpable because his workers are not his employees and he cannot compel them to use fall protection. Shawn D. Purvis, owner of Purvis Home Improvement Co. in Saco, pleaded not guilty to the charges in April.
It’s 2019 and the robots haven’t taken over...yet. Despite wild internet theories and predictions that robotics and automation would take jobs away from Americans, especially in the labor and trades, the United States is actually looking at a large skills gap in the trades and an even larger number of unfilled jobs.
Eric Giguere - trench collapse survivor and safety awareness expert - to speak at multiple United Rentals Forums during Trench Safety Stand Down
June 11, 2019
United Rentals, Inc. (NYSE: URI) today announced it is participating in a nationwide series of trench safety educational events during the Trench Safety Stand Down, which takes place June 17-21. These events will help organizations and their workers advance knowledge about trench hazards and safe work practices in trenching and excavation work.
Authorities are trying to determine if severe weather was the cause of a construction crane collapse yesterday in Dallas that killed one person and injured six. Severe storms with strong winds were moving through the area at the time of the incident in the city’s downtown. The crane plunged through four floors of an apartment building and onto a parking garage, causing some of the garage’s floors to collapse and burying vehicles in the rubble.