Company cited for workers repeating unsafe actions
A New York employer has been cited for a willful violation of federal safety regulations after allowing workers to resume unsafe work practices that had led to a serious injury only moments before.
The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration in Washington, DC, has cited Agway in Guilderland Center, NY, and proposed penalties of $137,500 against the firm for one alleged willful violation, two alleged repeat violations, one alleged failure-to-abate, and one alleged other-than-serious violation of OSHA standards. The company can contest the citations.
OSHA area director John Tomich says the action results from an investigation begun by OSHA on Aug. 16, 1999, following an accident at the Agway feed mill, in which an employee was permanently paralyzed in a fall. The employee had been standing on a conveyor, attempting to replace a broken conveyor belt, when he fell 9 feet to the concrete floor below and landed on a steel strip bolted to the floor.
"What we find especially significant is that shortly after the employee was taken to the hospital, two other employees were directed to continue the work under the exact same hazardous conditions," Tomich says. "Clearly there was a hazardous condition, but the employer was indifferent to the consequences."
OSHA alleges that the company willfully violated OSHA’s fall protection standard by failing to provide a guarded work platform or other form of fall protection. The willful violation carries a proposed penalty of $70,000. A willful violation is defined by OSHA as one committed with an intentional disregard for, or plain indifference to, the requirements of the OSHA act and regulations.
OSHA also charged the firm with two alleged repeat violations, with a total proposed penalty of $37,500, for not following required group lockout-tagout procedures when performing maintenance on the conveyor to prevent accidental startup while the equipment is being serviced. A repeat violation is one for which an employer has been previously cited for the same or a substantially similar condition and the citation has become a final order of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission. Agway was previously cited for this condition in April 1999.
The firm also received a failure-to-abate notice defined as an additional penalty issued against an employer who has failed to correct a violation, which has become a final order of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, for failing to implement preventive maintenance procedures in the facility. The alleged failure-to-abate violation has a proposed penalty of $30,000.
Agway also was charged with an alleged other-than-serious violation for having inadequate standard railings on work platforms. An other-than-serious violation is a hazardous condition that would probably not cause death or serious physical harm, but would have a direct and immediate relationship to the safety and health of employees.
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