Search

Cites the release of a report from the Human Rights Watch organization criticizing the working conditions among the meatpacking and slaughterhouses in the U.S. Claim by the report of the violation of human rights; Comparison of the injury rates between meatpacking plants and all other industries; Exposure of the plant employees to cutting injuries and asphyxiation by fumes from decaying matter; Counter by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration director Richard Fairfax of their strict enforcement safety programs.

Reports on the explosion of a leaking gas pipeline in Brussels, Belgium. Number of fatalities; Assistance of firemen at the site.

The article offers information on an announcement made by U.S. based Pall Corp., a supplier of filtration, separations and purification products, on winning the gold medal in the 2015 edition of The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) Occupational Health and Safety Awards. It informs that RoSPA focuses on achievements in occupational health and safety management systems.

The article discusses fatalities from falls in the residential construction industry and a resulting dispute between construction firms and the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). OSHA wants to require safety apparatus for workers toiling at heights of six feet and above. Construction contractors argue the new rules will make jobs longer and more costly.

The article discusses the zeal with which some companies pursue workplace safety. Safety monitors at oil company Exxon Mobil Corp. have observed handrail use among employees using stairs. A hotel worker at an event for food company Nestlé SA who jumped onto a stage instead of using the stairs was told to dismount and do it the right way. Particular attention is paid to safety-consciousness at the Utah operations of mining company Rio Tinto.

This article discusses safety measures taken by New York City transit workers. After two fatal accidents took place on the New York City subway during April of 2007, transit workers were given a 60-page document outlining safety measures while working on the subway. The document states that the most common cause of worker deaths was failure to look for an oncoming train before stepping onto the train tracks.

The article presents the perspective of the author regarding the regulations on trenches discussed at the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) seminar. He discusses the importance of fire drill in a company's premise because OSHA required so many fire extinguishers in the workplace. He also examines how injury lawsuits have done more to improve workplace safety than anything OSHA done.

An important new study has cast an appalling light on a place where workplace laws fail to protect workers, where wages and tips are routinely stolen, where having to work sick, injured or off the clock is the price of having a job. The place is the United States, all across the lower strata of the urban economy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Department of Buildings will share information about tower cranes with Chicago and Philadelphia in an effort to track equipment failures, manufacturers' recalls, accidents and industry trends, officials said on Thursday. There is currently no national database to track tower cranes or their parts, and the Buildings Department said that officials in several places, including New York State, New Jersey, Connecticut, California, Ontario and Dallas, had expressed interest in the new program. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Under the Bush administration, the Department of Labor has shirked its responsibility to upgrade workplace safety. In seven years, it has issued but one major rule change protecting workers against a chemical toxin -- and that was forced on it by court order. Now, it's taken a giant step beyond benign neglect. Political appointees at the agency have been discovered in a rush to duck public disclosure and jimmy into place a pro-industry rule making it more difficult to limit workers' exposure to poisonous chemicals. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Family members of miners killed after a huge collapse at a Utah mine last year expressed outrage on Friday after two federal reports showed that the mine had long been dangerous. The reports, released Thursday, also faulted the mine's operators for continuing to pull coal from deep within the mine despite the dangers and the government regulators for failing to stop them. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The operator of a collapsed Utah mine violated safety protocols by cutting coal pillars that should have been left standing to prevent cave-ins, federal regulators said. The officials said a subsidiary of the company, the Murray Energy Corporation, based in Ohio, had undermined other pillars by excavating coal from tunnel floors. They also faulted the company's engineering firm, Agapito Associates Inc. of Grand Junction, Colo., for conducting a flawed evaluation of mining dangers. The federal Mine Safety and Health Administration is fining Murray Energy affiliate Genwal Resources Inc. $1.6 million and Agapito $220,000 for the disaster, said Richard Stickler, the agency's chief. The Aug. 6 collapse trapped six miners whose bodies were never recovered. Three others were killed during a rescue attempt. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article reports that U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Edward Kennedy said that Congress needs to focus on worker safety and strengthening the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). A report by the Democratic staff of the panel said that 5,480 workers were killed on the job in 2006, a number rising since 2002. Kennedy said that the findings demonstrate serious flaws in the health and safety laws and OSHA's enforcement of them.

In the decades since steelworkers balanced at dizzying heights over Manhattan with little to prevent them from falling, high-rise construction has been layered in safety regulations and equipment. From straps and harnesses to guardrails and nets, safety devices have reduced the risk that a slip-up will lead to a death. But the limits of construction safety are being tested in the city. Amid a building boom, 10 people have been killed since the beginning of the year in high-rise job site accidents, some because a simple piece of safety equipment failed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article reports that the Roanoke distribution center of W.W. Grainger Inc. in Texas was recognized as one of the 10 safest companies in the U.S. by "Occupational Hazards," a safety health and loss prevention magazine. The company reached a safety milestone when its 250 employees logged 1 million continuous working hours with no lost-time accidents. Dean Kellogg, director of distribution operations for Roanoke facility said that their employees deserve recognition for this safety milestone.

The article presents an overview of industrial safety in the early 1900s in the United States and a discussion of the safety first campaign and society, which promoted industrial safety. A discussion of the impact the campaign and the society had on U.S. industry and American society in the 1900s is presented.

The article reports that an explosion in a karaoke parlor and bathhouse killed 25 people and injured 33 others in the Northeast of China. According to the state news agency Xinhua, the case was being investigated and did not give details regarding suspects. It is stated that China has experienced a lot of accidents due to lack of safety measures and the government has failed to improve security in public places.

Deals with the safety training activities conducted by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration in North and East Texas, on May 18, 2005. Remarks from Rogers-O'Brien Construction Co. on the activities; Importance of the activities on improving the practices and measures in construction operations; Benefits of construction firms which participated in the training.

Highlights the Health and Safety Conference and Expo on March 31, 2005, sponsored by the Connecticut Business and Industry Association (CBIA), that will focus on health and safety issues at Southington, Connecticut. Keynote speakers; Activities and programs: Topics to be discusses in the conference; Attendees.

Examines the efforts to prevent accidents at railroad crossings in the U.S. Problems caused by malfunctioning safety signals and gates along railroad tracks; Frequency of accidents in which trains collide with pedestrians and vehicles; Policies of the Federal Railroad Administration which govern safety equipment and the response to accidents; Efforts of the Administration to monitor signal operation and safety procedures.

The U.S. House began debate today on the first of four Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) bills, with Republicans and Democrats clashing over whether the bills would weaken or strengthen worker protections. The bills would increase the time a company has to respond to a citation under OSHA.

Reports that NASA will move quickly to improve communications in the agency after the release of a survey showing employees are still apprehensive about speaking up on safety questions. Identification of the company that is tasked to develop and administer a plan to change the organizational culture of NASA; Discovery that open communications were not the norm as the reason for people's apprehensions to speak up; Necessity of creating a climate where open communications is not only permissible but is also encouraged.

Reports on the status of the legal battle between a small group of Mexican coal miners and the CW Mining Co. in Huntington, Utah as of March 2004. Complaints of unsafe working conditions filed by the group against the company; Case background; Safety measures demanded by the workers.

Discusses Wal-Mart employees' objections to the company's policy of locking its overnight workers in. Reasons for the policy of locking overnight workers in; Ordeal of employee Michael Rodriguez of Texas, who was unable to exit a Sam's Club facility when his ankle was crushed by a machine; Wal-Mart's defense of its policy; Views of employees and of retail industry experts; Wal-Mart's concerns about theft.

Discusses the efforts of prosecutor Roy J. Hubert Jr. to bring high-profile criminal cases against employers who kill workers by violating workplace safety laws. Consideration of the laws in California which allow prosecutors to persecute employers for workplace deaths; Creation of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration in 1970; How Hubert plans to improve safety laws for farmers in rural areas; Death of José Altorre, a welder, due to suffocation in a manure hole at the Faria dairy farm.

Reports that approximately 100 workers die in the U.S. annually as a result of work-related injuries caused by violations in workplace safety laws. Cases of workers being electrocuted, buried alive, and shredded to death; Investigation of safety violations by the U.S. federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration; How the families of victims are treated poorly by company bureaucracies; Consideration of how WorldCom paid $750 million in civil fines for misleading investors; Reluctance of OSHA to persue criminal prosecutions.

Reports on the deaths of Joy Antony and Kurien Baby, New York City subway safety workers. Details of their deaths in accidents related to their efforts to install safety lights; Efforts of New York City Transit officials to rewrite safety regulations in response to these accidents; Dispute between transit officials and the transit union.

Reports that routine track maintenance in the New York City subway system will continue with extra security precautions after two workers were killed by trains. Disagreement between the transit union and New York City Transit officials over safety rules; Details of the security measures employed by transit officials; Details of the accidents.

Offers observations on workers' compensation programs and job safety. Few workers who would take lower pay in exchange for ergonomic safety rules; View of economist Robert H. Frank that governmental safety regulations are needed not to protect workers from their employers, but to protect workers from their own individual desires; His argument on why it is rational for a worker to sacrifice safety for income; Standards endorsed by the United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

The article informs that Continental Gold Ltd. has provided an update for its Buriticá project in Antioquia, Colombia. It informs that the company remains debt-free and well-funded with approximately 130 million U.S. dollars in its treasury. It mentions that the company has celebrated 365 days without a lost-time accident for employees as of August 20, 2013, as the achievement validates extensive safety procedures implemented over the past two years.