safety
sb admin | January 14, 2008The front page of Sunday's Washington Post (Jan. 13) featured the blackened face of coal miner Forest Ramey, 24, but the story was not about a deadly explosion or workers trapped underground. A Dark Addiction, by the Post's Nick Miroff, gives us a peak into the lives of coal miners who are struggling with painkiller abuse.
"Tazewell County, Va. The crowd is gathering early in the dirt parking lot outside the Clinch Valley Treatment Center, the only methadone clinic within 80 miles. ...It is 2:45 am...the clinic does not start dosing until 5 am. ...Many of the patients who fill…
sb admin | January 7, 2008It's been three weeks since the deadly explosion at the Jacksonville, Florida T2 laboratory which claimed the lives of four workers and injured others on and off the site. The US Chemical Safety Board (CSB), along with OSHA and other agencies, is investigating the disaster and lead CSB official, Robert Hall, offered the following information on Jan 3 about the event:
"The blast at T2 was among the most powerful ever examined by the CSB."
"...There are several steps in the process [of producing the gasoline additive MMT]; the first step involved heating and reacting organic materials with…
sb admin | January 4, 2008In all the rigmarole of the holiday season, you might not have heard about the consumer safety hazard associated with Christmas lights (or noticed the fine print warnings on their boxes).
Itâs no secret that lead is used in light stringsâ polyvinyl chloride insulation to prevent deterioration and to guard against fire. But what is a new development this year is the revelation that handling the wiring while you âdeck the hallsâ may result in significant lead exposure.
According to CNN, laboratory tests using the Consumer Product Safety Commissionâs wipe test for lead in polyvinyl chloride…
sb admin | January 3, 2008A coal mine operator in Hazard, Kentucky received a $220,000 penalty from MSHA for flagrantly violating electrical lockout/tagout procedures (such as padlocking an on/off switch to ensure that a machine is not unexpectedly turned-on, plugged in or energized while it is being serviced.)  The hefty monetary penalty was authorized under the 2006 MINER Act for flagrant violations, defined as:
"a reckless or repeated failure to make reasonable efforts to eliminate a known violation of a mandatory safety and health standard that substantially and proximately caused, or reasonably could have…
sb admin | December 21, 2007The families of the workers killed at the T2 Lab are now planning memorial services instead of holiday celebrations.
"With Christmas next week, we're not shopping for gifts--we've got to go look at caskets,"
said a relative of Parrish Ashley, 36, one of the four men killed in the Wednesday explosion.  Mr. Ashley and his deceased co-worker, Karey Henry, 35 were best friends, according to family members. They were:
"side by side in a break-room trailer about 1:30 pm when they were killed by a blast that witnesses described as like a bomb going off.  'They were together throughout all…
sb admin | December 19, 2007Updated 12/20: See belowÂ
Four workers were killed and at least 14 people were injured in a violent explosion at the T2 Labs in Jacksonville, Florida. The firm manufacturers Ecotane®, the gasoline additive "methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl" (i.e., MMT® or MCMT), which increases the octane rating of gasoline. The firm says that its Florida facility is state-of-the art, and uses a "novel, safe and efficient process." We'll have to wait for OSHA or the Chemical Safety Board to tell us whether they had an effective process management safety system.Â
The company's…
sb admin | December 6, 2007The New York Times' headline read:
350 Men Entombed in Mine Explosion. Rescue Force at Work in the Debris of Two Shattered Mines at Monongah, West Va. Poisonous Gas Pours Out.
At about 10:00 am on Dec 6, 1907, a violent explosion of methane gas and coal dust killed hundreds of workers at two adjacent underground coal mines owned by Consolidated Coal Company. The official death toll is listed at 362, but in Davitt McAteer's new book Monongah, his research suggests the disaster claimed the lives of more than 550 men and boys.
In the days following the disaster, the New York Times…
sb admin | December 6, 2007A quick look at âPredictors of Psychostimulant Use by Long-Distance Truck Driversâ by Ann Williamson in the American Journal of Epidemiology.
An Australian study finds that paying truck drivers by the job (instead of by the hour or week) leads to increased driver use of amphetamines and other stimulants, which is associated with increased risk for highway crashes.
Anne Williamson's analysis of self-reported stimulant use among truck drivers found between âone in five and one in three drivers reported using stimulants at least sometimesâ and âstimulant drug use was twice as likely for…
sb admin | December 4, 2007It's been nearly four months since nine men were killed at the Crandall Canyon mine in Emery County, Utah. Congressman George Miller (D-CA) held a hearing in early October on the disaster, but a Senate hearing, scheduled for Dec 4, for which the mine operator Robert Murray had been subpeonaed, was cancelled. The Salt Lake Tribune's Mike Gorrell and Robert Gherke reported recently on photographs taken inside the mine:
"If there was any question about the power of a mine bounce--created when the immense pressures on the coal pillars supporting the roof cause coal to blow out of the walls…
sb admin | December 4, 2007Elizabeth Williamson of the Washington Post has written powerful article on the failure of the regulatory system to ensure that amusement park âthrillâ rides donât kill or injure customers, primarily teenagers and children. She provides grisly detail on a topic weâve talked about here before: the inability and/or unwillingness of the Consumer Product Safety Commission to protect the public.
After describing one series of identical accidents that occurred several times on the same ride, Williamson notes
The CPSC has no employee whose full-time job is to ensure the safety of such rides. The…
sb admin | November 14, 2007OSHA's long-awaited rule on "who pays for personal protective equipment" has finally seen the light of day.  Assistant Secretary of Labor Edwin Foulke made the announcement today in a telephone press conference; workers and employers should be able to read the rule in the Federal Register on November 15. The Agency proposed this rule more than 8 years ago, and in today's statements, officials repeated that the final rule is very similar to the March 1999 proposal.Â
"...clarifications have added several paragraphs to the regulatory text."
Several paragaphs in 8 years???  Well then…
sb admin | November 9, 2007Tyler Kahle, 19, (photo) and Craig Bagley, 27 (photo) were killed four months ago at the NovaGold Resources' Rock Creek mine near Nome, Alaska. MSHA is completing its investigation; so far, all the Kahle family has been told is that the lift basket was 90 feet off the ground and "it tipped over." Sadly, what the Kahle family has learned, is that mothers, fathers and other family-member victims of workplace fatalities have few if any rights, the exclusive liability provision of state workers' compensation laws is a cruel joke, and families are excluded from the fatality…
sb admin | November 2, 2007Workers dying from asphyxiation in a confined space is a senseless tragedy. When four men lose their lives in this way, with three of them dying in an attempt to rescue the other, it is a genuine disaster.  Yesterday, four men died inside a 12-foot deep sewer line at the Lakehead Blacktop Demolition Landfill in the Village of Superior, Wisconsin. County Sheriff Tom Dalbec said:
"One of the workers was trying to repair a pump or clear a blockage in the sewer line last yesterday when he was overcome by hydrogen sulfide fumes. ...First one goes down and is overcome by gas and drops…
sb admin | November 1, 2007Three young widows of Harlan County are taking a stand against incumbent Kentucky Governor Ernie Fletcher (R). An op-ed by Claudia Cole, Stella Morris, and Melissa Lee appeared in the Lexington Herald Leader, with harsh words about the Governor's record on mine safety and rights for victims' families.
"Gov. Ernie Fletcher has disrespected our families and has not kept his word. ...[We] urge all Kentucky coal miners and their families to join us in voting against Fletcher in Tuesday's election. ...We refuse to support a politician like Fletcher who stands in the way of protecting…
sb admin | October 30, 2007Working a weekend shift has been particularly dangerous for West Virginia coal miners this year. All seven coal-mining related fatalities in the State have occurred on weekend shifts. The latest victim was Mr. Charles Jason Keeney, 34, who died on Sunday while working underground at the Long Branch Energy's Mine No. 23 in Boone County, WV. The miner was killed by a piece of falling coal or rock, according to the WV Office of Miners' Health, Safety & Training (WVMHST)
The Charleston Gazette's Ken Ward writes that the day after this last fatality, Mr. Ron Wooten, the director of…
sb admin | October 22, 2007Shawn Boone was only 33 years old in 2003 when he was fatally burned from several violent explosions at the Hayes Lemmerz plant in Huntington, Indiana. The plant manufactured cast aluminum automotive wheels.  These firey blasts, which also severely burned two other workers, were fueled by aluminum dust which had accumulated in the plant. That same year, chemical dust-fueled explosions at CTA Acoustics in Corbin, Kentucky and at West Pharmaceuticals in Kinston, NC took the lives of 13 workers and injured dozens of others. The death toll from these workplace disasters compelled…
sb admin | October 9, 2007What do three women made widows by three fatal Kentucky coal mining accidents have in common with two others left behind in the 2006 airline crash?
"I am a widow. I am a single parent. I'm an advocate for anyone suffering because they were robbed of their spouse due to ineptitude and/or negligence,"
said Sarah King Fortney, (here) whose 49 year-old husband C.W. Fortney was killed when Comair flight 5191 crashed after taking-off from the wrong runway at the Lexington, KY airport in August 2006. Mrs. Fortney was recently honored, along with four other widows, by the Kentucky Justice…
sb admin | October 5, 2007Anthony Aguirre, 18, Donald Dejaynes, 43, Gary Foster, 48, Dupree Holt, 37 and James St. Peters, 52 were the five maintenance workers killed on Tuesday afternoon in a tunnel fire at the Xcel hydro-electric plant near Georgetown, Colorado. If you want any information about the fatal workplace incident, don't bother visiting OSHA's website; you'll find not a word about this workplace disaster.Â
I've been peeved (as have many others) for MSHA's failure to provide up-to-date and accurate information about mining fatalities and its accident investigation process. Should we not hold OSHA to…
sb admin | September 27, 2007The recent recalls of dangerous toys and defective cribs have received a great deal of press attention, but closer analysis reveals that consumer product recalls are generally ineffective at getting most defective products out of consumersâ homes.
In many cases, the vast majority of the dangerous recalled items are never returned to the manufacturer. Confusing instructions, missing or late mailing labels, and store clerks who refuse to take returns are among the problems that consumers describe. Consumer advocates point to a problem with the system, which lets companies choose whether…
purepedantry | July 23, 2007Despite numerous statements by the airline industry and government to the contrary, it is in fact slightly safer to sit at the back of the plane in a plane crash. The first class cabin had the lowest survival rate for the crashes they examined.
Hat-tip: Slashdot.