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Environmental Health and Safety Blog | EHSWire

Industrial Hygiene…It’s a 24 Hour Job!

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Sep 20, 2010 4:12:14 AM

Paula Kaufmann, CIH

I just read an article in the New York Times ( Hazards: Watch Where You Point That Laser) about a 15-year boy who bought a laser pointer on the Internet.  He selected this particular model as the light was supposed to be powerful enough pop balloons and burn holes in fabric.  And, it was all he had hoped for and more.  He popped balloons from a distance and burnt holes in his sister’s sneakers.  However, he literally got burned by the “and more” features of his new toy. Tragically, he shined the pointer in a mirror and the light beam reflected back onto one of his eyes causing major damage. 

My first thought was, “How stupid was that”.  My second thought was more balanced, “I guess he wasn’t properly trained or didn’t read the instructions”.  I’ve been told by loved ones that I can be a bit intrusive (if not annoying) with my unconscious monitoring of unsafe behavior in my constant role of “health and safety inspector”.  So be it!  According to the Home Safety Council, every year there are millions of preventable home-related incidents and accidents “ that result in nearly 20,000 deaths and 21 million medical visits”.  

Here are some examples of what I consider stupid (or let’s say shortsighted) actions -- some at work, some at home. Yes, I make these observations all the time to family and friends and, as you can imagine, that can be a bit trying for them but I feel it’s worth the price.

  • Using an electric lawn mower on a damp lawn with damaged extension cords repaired with electrical tape AND with the ground prong clipped. Worse yet – asking my child to use this dangerous setup!

  • Removing the guard from a circular saw.

  • Cutting overhead branches without wearing a hard hat or eye protection.

  • Smoking a cigarette, cigar or pipe while filling a car with gas. Worse yet – a gas station attendants smoking cigarettes while pumping gas.

  • Construction or utility workers using a jack hammer on a concrete sidewalk and not wearing safety glasses or hearing protection while wearing a hard hat.

  • Police directing traffic without wearing a traffic safety vest. Worse yet – doing this after dark in a dark uniform without white gloves.

  • Mowing the lawn in sandals and shorts without eye protection while listening to music at full volume (using earphones not noise reducing hearing protection).

  • Eating snacks while removing paint from old furniture or woodwork in a house built before WW I, which makes the lead content highly probable.  Worse yet – having your kids help you while you dry sweep or use a regular household vacuum to “clean up” the area.

  • Utility worker serving as a confined space watch (at the ground level of an underground manway) talking (and laughing) on a cell phone and drinking coffee (usually about 10 feet from the manway).

  • Nail salon workers wearing dust masks while applying acrylics to customers’ nails -- dust masks don’t reduce exposure to the chemicals used during acrylic application. Worse yet - acrylic nail services happening in a tiny storefront with limited ventilation.

  • Being “careful” when installing an electrical light by shutting off the switch to the power but not the circuit breaker to the line.

  • Applying insect repellant from an aerosol can while sitting by a bonfire.

  • Removing a bicycle helmet as soon as your mom can’t see you as it is just too hot to protect your brain.


And, finally, one of my favorite tales is the time that I was away from home on a business trip, and while I was gone, my husband renovated my home office space.  He did a beautiful job, but when I asked him why he went through the effort to surprise me, he said “It is so much easier to get work done when the OSHA inspector is not home”.  I just wish I could have given him a citation.

If you’re interested in home safety, September – National Preparedness Month -- is a good time to begin.  You can start with a visit the website of the Home Safety Council® (HSC), a national nonprofit organization dedicated to preventing home-related injuries. You’ll  find dozens of tips, stories and videos and information about Safety Saturday (September 25) at participating Lowe’s stores.

What are some of your favorite observations of “stupid” health and safety practices outside of the work environment? And, if you’re a health and safety professional, how do you balance maintaining a safe home life without driving your friends and family crazy?
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Topics: health and safety, General Industry H&S, General EHS, Emergency Response, worker safety, Occupational Safety, emergency response training, Fire Safety, Public Safety, water safety, industrial hygiene, home safety

Hazardous Waste: Is It or Isn’t It?

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Aug 30, 2010 12:03:15 AM

Dian Cucchisi, PhD, CHMM

Environmental Health and Safety Professionals are often faced with questions that do not seem to have black and white answers, but, in reality, regulatory requirements are not that gray.  A common question: When do the requirements for 29 CFR 1910.120 and 29 CFR 1926.65 (OSHA’s Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response regulations) apply?  The challenge for EHS professionals is to communicate to workers the distinction between what are considered environmental health risks and the risks to human health, and to clarify the difference of the word “hazardous” as used by various environmental protection agencies and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the state environmental protection agencies have standards for soil and groundwater “cleanliness” for residential and non-residential properties.  Soil or groundwater in exceedence of those standards needs to be remediated (usually by removal), but to add to the confusion, sometimes when soil and/or groundwater is removed from the site and transported to a disposal facility it may not fall into the EPA’s definition for hazardous waste.  So here lies the misunderstanding; if it is not classified as “hazardous waste” by the EPA, people often make the determination that it is not considered hazardous to workers and, therefore, it is not necessary to take measures to protect the workers’ health and safety.

When it comes to worker safety and the risks to human health, we must look at the requirements provided by OSHA.   OSHA is focused on exposure potential and the resulting hazard assessment evaluation to workers from the chemicals that may be encountered when working in areas with potentially contaminated soil and/or groundwater.  If the chemicals present are regulated by OSHA with a Permissible Exposure Limit (exposure based on an 8-hour average), the employer is required to conduct exposure assessments and air monitoring to determine potential risks to the workers onsite.  It also requires that workers are protected from these potential exposures through either engineering controls or personal protective equipments (such as tyvek, gloves and respirators).

 There is also a need to protect the workers and meet all the other applicable OSHA standards that mitigate health and safety risks to workers on this site.   Such required protection would include: 

  • developing a site-specific health and safety plan,

  • training workers in chemical hazards and controls,

  • conducting environmental monitoring to determine exposure,

  • instituting controls (PPE and Engineering) to protect from exposure potential,

  • clean up (decontamination).and a number of other procedures.  


It is surprising and frustrating that this issue is still debated, but if it is, doesn’t it make sense to use the guidelines in these standards to clarify? We are talking about human health and the regulations are clear about the requirements for worker training and personal protection when dealing with chemical contamination.  You can use the environmental classifications to determine how to treat the situation, but you must look to OSHA to protect the workers as they are doing it.

Have you ever had workplace confusion regarding environmental risk and hazardous to human health? If so, I'd like to hear about your situation and how you resolved it.
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Topics: OSHA, DOT, health and safety, General Industry H&S, Construction H&S, EPA, Hazardous Waste Management, Hazardous Materials, Compliance, worker safety, Occupational Health, Occupational Safety

Understanding Employee Safety Affects the Corporate Bottom Line (as demonstrated by Upper Big Branch Mine)

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Jul 26, 2010 5:40:09 AM


Paula Kaufmann, CIH

National Public Radio ( NPR) recently reported their findings of an investigation of safety issues at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia.  I was listening to the report while enjoying my morning walk in a nearby park.  It stopped me in my tracks!

As part of their investigative report, NPR discovered that there were situations at the mine when the methane gas monitors on continuous mining machines were disabled because the monitors repeatedly shut down the machines.  The miners interviewed explained that supervisors told them it was acceptable to disable these monitors as long as the miner operating the equipment used a hand-held methane monitor to test the air.  This is the part of the report that stopped me in my tracks!!!

The methane gas monitors are an essential part of the mining machine’s fail-safe system. They are factory-installed and essential components of the machine design; when the monitor senses an explosive atmosphere, the mining machine shuts down automatically.  The ONLY reason that spark-generating equipment can be operated in an environment likely to contain explosive concentrations of methane gas is precisely because the equipment is designed to automatically shut down if an explosive atmosphere is encountered. 

The procedures followed at the mine undermined (no pun intended) a fundamental safety feature of the continuous mining machine. 

The problem with using a hand-held monitor as a substitute for the interlock monitor is that the miner operating a continuous mining machine is 25 to 30 feet behind the face of a machine that is a continuous source of ignition (lots of sparks from metal cutting coal and rocks).  The monitor must be located directly at the source of the spark.  The miner isn’t at the source.

How could the mine leadership eliminate a critical risk management feature?  When deciding to override a critical safety system, the mine leadership should have considered the potential for loss of life AND damage to the mine AND damage to operating equipment.  You have to wonder if anyone really thought about “what if?” especially as Upper Big Branch was a notoriously “gassy” (methane producing) and, therefore, dangerous mine.  I wonder if any hazard or risk analyses were ever conducted for operating the mining machine without an operational methane monitor.   For clarity – here is a brief explanation about the hazards and risks of overriding a safety critical system and the outcome of their analyses:

What’s the difference between hazard and risk?

  • A hazard is the source of potential damage, harm or adverse health effects on something or someone (i.e., explosive concentration level of methane gas, source of ignition).

  • A risk is the chance or probability that damage, harm or adverse health effect will occur if something or someone is exposed to a hazard (i.e., a chance of the methane gas concentration would reach explosive levels in the presence of a source of ignition).


 A risk assessment is the process where one

  • Identifies hazards,

  • Evaluates the risk associated with that hazard, and

  • Determines appropriate ways to eliminate or control the hazard.

  • Safety controls minimize the risk by “controlling” the hazard (i.e., shutting down the mining machine eliminates the source of ignition)


Managers must understand the risk and the systems that put in place to control the hazard.  This is “managing the risk”. 

At the Upper Big Branch mine, the life-saving interlock system in a known high risk environment was disabled while workers were assured that an inappropriately-located substitute would be effective and work continued without interruption. It appears that appropriate risk management was not the goal since the presence of combustible concentrations of methane gas at sources of ignition might not be detected using the hand held monitors.   

The integrity of an organization depends on a leadership commitment to understanding and managing risk to protect their employees and assets as well as their reputation. This NPR report highlights what can happen when leadership is focused on one measure of success, in this case, production. Another recent example of compromised risk in exchange for uninterrupted production is the BP oil leak. Have you ever encountered myopic leadership in your workplace that trades risk management for another benefit. What happened? How do employees feel?
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Topics: General Industry H&S, Emergency Response, Hazardous Materials, Compliance, worker safety, Occupational Safety, Fire Safety, Exposure, Respiratory, Confined Space

Why We Need More than Common Sense Safety for Natural Gas Pipe System Cleaning and Purging Operations

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Jul 20, 2010 2:22:39 AM

By Don Hoeschele, MS, CHMM

The U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) recently approved recommendations to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and other organizations to help prevent explosions and fires during pipe cleaning and purging operations.  As recently as February 7, 2010 at the Kleen Energy power plant in Middletown, CT, an explosion caused six fatalities and numerous injuries during the cleaning of a natural gas pipe system. Another similar explosion occurred at the ConAgra Foods Slim Jim plant in Garner, NC on June 9, 2009 and caused the death of four workers. In both instances, an operation termed “natural gas blow” was utilized to force natural gas under pressure through a piping system during construction and prior to startup of the plant’s turbines to rid the pipe system of non-natural gas impurities and debris. The gas was vented to the ambient atmosphere at open pipe ends less than 20 feet from the ground, and in worker areas where the gas easily found a source of ignition.  It seems that common sense would lead one to never vent natural gas near sources of ignition.

  • At Kleen Energy the potential ignition sources included electrical power to the building, welders actively working and diesel-fueled heaters running in the vicinity.

  • Approximately TWO MILLION cubic feet of natural gas were released at Kleen Energy on February 7, 2010 during the “natural gas blow”, enough natural gas, according to the CSB, to provide heating and cooking fuel to the average American home every day for more than 25 years.


The CSB determined that no specific federal workplace safety standard exists that would prohibit the intentional release of natural gas into the workplace. Yes, I was shocked when I read that, too! Eighteen urgent recommendations were provided and voted on by the CSB to prevent future disasters. Some of the recommendations include – Prohibiting the use of natural gas for pipe cleaning and using alternatives such as compressed air, steam and other chemical substitutes, and upgrading the current gas safety standards for general industry and construction that are considered by the CSB to contain “significant gaps” that threaten the safety of workers at such facilities.

In February 2010, the CSB issued a safety bulletin titled “ Seven Key Lessons to Prevent Worker Deaths During Hot Work In and Around Tanks”.  This bulletin highlights another gap in the OSHA standards, “While the OSHA standard prohibits hot work in an explosive atmosphere, it does not explicitly require the use of a combustible gas detector”. 

It is an unfortunate fact that such regulatory “gaps” can be found in many industries. We are reminded of these gaps while reading of disasters such as these, or more currently, watching the daily updates of oil washing ashore in the Gulf of Mexico.  It is certainly welcome news that these CSB draft recommendations were quickly approved without amendments to help prevent future explosions during pipe cleaning operations.

Do you know of other examples of what would seem to be ‘common sense’ safety measures that are not utilized because “this is the way we have always done it” wins over common sense?
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Topics: OSHA, health and safety, General Industry H&S, Emergency Response, Chemical Safety Board, Hazardous Materials, Compliance, worker safety, emergency response training, Fire Safety, NFPA

Employee “Wellness” – not just for work!

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Jul 5, 2010 1:00:31 AM


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Topics: Personal Protective Equipment, health and safety, General Industry H&S, Construction H&S, H&S Training, Respiratory, water safety

Could a Bhopal Disaster Happen Here?

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Jun 21, 2010 1:00:36 AM

Dian Cucchisi, PhD, CHMM

The Bhopal Disaster has been in the news again with the eight former company executives getting convicted of negligence.     A court in the Indian city of Bhopal returned the verdict on June 7, 2010, more than 25 years after the incident

What was the Bhopal Disaster?

For those of us old enough to remember, the words “Bhopal, India” brings to mind the very tragic events of December 2, 1984.  On that day a Union Carbide facility had an accidental release of approximately 40 tons of methyl isocyanate, a chemical used in pesticides.  The chemical plume killed 3,000 people and left an estimated 500,000 people with long-term, damaging health effects.  Amnesty International reports that approximately 15,000 people died in the subsequent years as a result of this incident.  As a result the Union Carbide Bhopal accident is often considered the world's worst industrial disaster.

And then a smaller, but similar event occurred in the USA…

In August 1985 a Union Carbide facility located in Institute, West Virginia experienced an accidental release of toxic chemicals causing more than 100 residents of the area to seek medical treatment.

US Regulators Respond to Community Concerns

In response to these incidents and the growing concern by the American public that this could happen in their backyard, regulatory agencies enacted laws for facilities that manufacture, store, or use certain chemicals above designated threshold quantities.

In 1986 the United States Congress passed the Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act (EPCRA). The law requires facilities to annually report the quantities of “extremely hazardous substances” to the facility’s state and the Local Emergency Planning Committee (LEPC).  This information is available to any member of the public upon request to the LEPC.

In late 1985, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) created the Hazard Communication Standard (HCS) (29 CFR 1910.1200) also known as “Right to Know.”  The HCS requires manufacturers and distributors of hazardous materials to communicate to employees the hazards of the chemicals in their workplace by providing Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) and ensure that hazardous materials are labeled according to certain requirements.

The Clean Air Act was amended by Congress in 1990, including some regulatory changes intending to create safer workplaces and mitigate the risk of a Bhopal-like disaster in the US, such as:

  • Charging the EPA and OSHA with more authority over the chemical industry.

    • OSHA created the Process Safety Management Standard (29 CFR 1910.119), a program that looks in depth at process technologies, procedures and management practices.

    • The EPA codified Chemical Accident Prevention Provisions (40 CFR Part 68) which requires facilities to conduct a hazard assessment, develop a prevention program, and implement a risk management plan.

    • Other laws that regulate the use of hazardous materials were enhanced.  These include the Toxic Substance Control Act (TSCA); the Resource, Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA); and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA).



  • Creating the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB). 


The Senate legislative history states: "The principal role of the new chemical safety board is to investigate accidents to determine the conditions and circumstances which led up to the event and to identify the cause or causes so that similar events might be prevented." Congress gave the CSB a unique statutory mission and provided in law that no other agency or executive branch official may direct the activities of the Board. Congress directed that the CSB's investigative function be completely independent of the rulemaking, inspection, and enforcement authorities of EPA and OSHA. The CSB became operational in January 1998.  

Accidents in the U.S. STILL OCCUR

In spite of this, accidents continue to happen.  In 2002, the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) examined 167 chemical accidents that occurred between 1980 and 2001.  More than half of those accidents involved chemicals not covered by the regulations mentioned above.  The CSB recommended that the EPA and OSHA expand their regulations.  The Agencies did not agree with the recommendation stating they feel the best approach is worker education.  In 2004, OSHA formed an alliance with the EPA, the American Chemistry Council (ACC), and others to develop and provide worker education on chemical reactivity hazards. 

How do you feel about the expansion of regulations to include chemicals currently not covered by regulations designed to prevent accidents and reduce health risk?
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Topics: OSHA, health and safety, General Industry H&S, EPA, Emergency Response, H&S Training, Compliance, TSCA & R.E.A.C.H., Air Sampling, emergency response training, Exposure, environmental air monitoring, Respiratory, Public Safety

Safety & Health Training – A Victim of Its Own Success?

Posted by Shivi Kakar

Jun 14, 2010 1:11:20 AM

Capt. John DeFillippo, CHMP, EMT-B

These are tough economic times and businesses are looking to cut costs and save money. A disturbing trend I have noticed is the willingness of many companies to make cuts in safety programs and employee training in a misguided attempt to improve the bottom line.

Trained workers are safer workers.  The facts bear this out. Shortsighted statements I’ve heard include; “We don’t have problems in that area, so we’re cutting back on training.”, when the training was most likely the reason for the lack of problems.

Often, it is difficult to see how beneficial training can be until you experience the effects of its absence. Negative indications show themselves in higher EMRs, increased workman’s compensation claims, lost production time, and property damage. Only companies actively tracking and trending incidents are likely to realize this. (By the way, such companies would also be the ones least likely to make such cuts in the first place!)

It takes just one serious incident resulting in injuries to quickly eliminate any savings associated with cutting programs and training.  What’s more, most health and safety training is required by regulations, so there is also the risk of fines for non-compliance. These can be hefty and since most companies don’t budget for them, they become an extraordinary cost – right off the bottom line!

At Emilcott, we have seen firsthand the effects that result from a lack of training.  Recently, we were hired by a client who laid-off their safety director a couple years prior.  After starting our work, we informed the client of numerous safety violations throughout their organization. These appeared to be a direct result of the lapse in proper safety training – since they no longer had a safety director to oversee their program.  Through the Emilcott Training Institute, our client was able to receive the training needed to avoid these safety violations – and keep their employees safe and on the job. However, in their attempt to save money, the client ended up spending more in a short period of time just to catch up.

Making drastic H&S budget cuts just never pay off.  As experienced health and safety consultants, we work with our clients to offer solutions when budgets get tight:

  • Outsource until you can hire again – we have provided EHS professionals at our clients’ sites for just this purpose for both short and long term requirements.

  • Prioritize your H&S needs – consider the total reduction in your workforce or operations to determine where you can pull back and where you cannot.

  • Take advantage of training courses open to the public – it may no longer be economically sound to run a training course in-house, but don’t lapse on required courses.

  • Take advantage of FREE resources – many consultants provide lots of free info and OSHA will provide all types of assistance at no cost. As an example, Emicott offers a comprehensive Free Training Needs Assessment at www.emilcott.com!

  • Pool resources – look toward your industry’s professional organizations or neighboring companies to share services. Maybe a part-time Safety Director is better than none at all.

  • Ask a professional – put together a plan and a program to get you through the lean times


Has your company adjusted their health and safety program for leaner times?

Have you seen a direct effect and how are you compensating?
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Topics: OSHA, health and safety, General Industry H&S, Construction H&S, Emergency Response, H&S Training, Compliance, worker safety, Occupational Health, Occupational Safety, Fire Safety, Occupational Training, Lab Safety, Safety Training in Spanish

Vapor Intrusion Air Sampling…Getting the Big Picture

Posted by Shivi Kakar

May 29, 2010 11:18:04 PM

Dale Wilson, CIH, LEED AP


“Vapor intrusion refers to this migration of volatile chemicals from the subsurface into overlying buildings.”  Vapor intrusion (VI) air sampling is a method to evaluate if chemical vapors are entering a building due to contaminated soil or groundwater that is on or adjacent to the property on which the building is built. In order for vapors to enter a building from the soil or groundwater there have to be pathways such as  cracks in the foundation, openings around piping used for mechanical, pluming, and electrical systems, groundwater entering the basement just to name a few. Once vapors are in a basement or crawlspace, there have to be additional pathways for the vapors to enter the first floor occupied space. 
When it comes to vapor intrusion understanding “why it is happening” is just as important as understanding “what is happening”.

What is Vapor Intrusion?

“Vapor intrusion has become a significant environmental issue for regulators, industry leaders, and concerned residents. Degradation of the indoor air quality can cause fear and anxiety among building occupants, businesses, and other property owners.”

A Vapor Intrusion Project

Recently, Emilcott was hired to review vapor intrusion air sampling data collected by another consultant.  The building site was a large commercial property that was mostly composed of office space, but there was also an onsite daycare center.  After collecting data for several years, the vapor intrusion had not been resolved. 

After reviewing all the data, we made a site visit to help us understand what was contributing to the continued and increased vapor concentrations -- both in the basement of the building, which was used for storage, and in the first floor daycare center.   

Our initial site visit revealed multiple pathways that permitted vapors to enter the basement and additional pathways that permitted vapors to enter the first floor occupied space.  It was clear that the owner’s other consultant had focused on What Is Happening through continuous air sampling without understanding the dynamics of Why It Is Happening.  Based upon

  • An analysis of the collected air monitoring data,

  • A thorough site inspection, and

  • An understanding of vapor intrusion causes and migration,


we were able to propose a step-by-step procedure to protect the client’s building and occupants. In addition, by including the client in the process, the client stated that they had learned more about the building from our visit than they had over the several years of data collection.

Vapor Intrusion – A Way Out

When reviewing a VI problem with a building owner or property manager, indoor air quality consultants should have answers to these basic questions to fully understand the problem and suggest a remediation solution:

  1. What are the volatile chemicals that we are dealing with?

  2. What are the risks of short-term and prolonged exposure to these chemicals?

  3. Why and where are they getting into my building?

  4. Can I stop the VI chemicals from getting in?

  5. If I can’t stop the VI chemicals from getting in, what are the alternatives?


Interrupting and sealing the pathways is the only way to prevent building occupants from exposure to vapors. 

For our client the process of sealing pathways has been accelerated and should be complete in a few weeks.  With the complete understanding of vapor intrusion What? and Why?, a plan to seal the pathways between the ground and the basement, and the basement and the first floor, may reduce the occupants’ exposures to the vapors and avoid any increased levels of regulatory oversight and accelerated response actions.

Have you experienced a vapor intrusion problem that remains unresolved or puzzled the experts? Do you have questions about indoor air quality issues and evaluation techniques and best practices? Please share your story or questions below and we’ll respond quickly.
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Topics: indoor air quality, General Industry H&S, Construction H&S, Air Sampling, environmental air monitoring, Public Safety

Water Safety at Work

Posted by Shivi Kakar

May 24, 2010 2:57:16 AM

Capt. John DeFillippo, CHMP, EMT-B

Does your company have employees that work on, near or over water? Hazardous waste site and emergency response workers, those in the construction trades, surveyors and bridge inspection/repair crews are but a few occupations where this applies. OSHA regulations (29 CFR 1926.106 for example) cover the safety of such workers including training and protective equipment requirements. Other federal and state (USCG and TSA) regulations may also apply to your operation. For example, if you are working over water, such as bridge work, you must have a rescue skiff at the ready, with trained personnel to operate it, in case someone falls in. Working at piers, refineries or other marine facilities may entail very specific security requirements.

Water can be unforgiving of carelessness. As a veteran of the U.S. Coast Guard, an EMT and a licensed captain working in the marine salvage industry, I’ve seen plenty of tragedies on the water. Nearly all were avoidable. Here are some essential questions to help you assess your water safety knowledge:

  • Is everyone wearing personal flotation devices? Are they the right type, worn correctly, and U.S. Coast Guard approved?

  • What is the water temperature? In April in the mid-Atlantic region, the water is about 45 degrees F which means you can last about 15 minutes before hypothermia sets in.

  • Do you understand the risk of hypothermia? Even if the water is at 80 degrees F, it’s the same as being in air of 42 degrees F. And, water removes heat from the body 25 times faster than air of the same temperature.

  • Does everybody know how to swim? What to do if caught in a current? Will they know to swim parallel to the shore or go with it until you out of it? You can't swim against a current, even a gentle one, for very long, so don’t try.

  • If someone does fall in, what’s the plan? Formulating a plan when you hear the splash is too late! Having the proper rescue equipment and understanding how to use it is essential.

  • Who is trained in CPR and Basic First Aid? Knowing what to do in an emergency saves lives! Too many would-be rescuers become victims themselves, so leave water rescue to those who have the training and tools.

  • Is the boat operator trained? Employers who would never think of allowing an untrained person to operate a crane often have no problem letting someone without proper training operate a boat on a navigable waterway. Many states, including New Jersey, now require all operators of power-driven vessels to take an approved Safe Boating Course. Fines can be steep and may get the vessel impounded.


The Emilcott Training Institute offers many training programs that can help keep workers safe, including an 8-hour Water Safety and Boating Basics that is approved by the NJ State Police and recognized in several other states as well. Fall Protection, Water Safety and Red Cross CPR and Basic First Aid are also offered in-house or on-site. If you have ANY questions about water safety at work, give Emilcott a call or comment below.
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Topics: OSHA, Personal Protective Equipment, health and safety, General Industry H&S, Construction H&S, Emergency Response, H&S Training, worker safety, Occupational Safety, emergency response training, Occupational Training, water safety, Water Response Plan

Occupational Lyme Disease

Posted by Shivi Kakar

May 10, 2010 2:36:10 AM


<a href="ht tp://ehswire.com/writers/">John DeFillippo, CHMP
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Topics: health and safety, General Industry H&S, Construction H&S, worker safety, Occupational Health, Public Safety

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