Bronx Construction Accident Law Blog

The United States Postal Service ("USPS") is quite obviously a favorite target of OSHA investigators. Over the past five years, OSHA has conducted more than 900 inspections of USPS facilities across the United States and handed out more than 600 citations.

The recent OSHA violations issued to the USPS Bulk Mail Center in Kansas City are a continuation of the theme. Saying that, "There is no excuse for the lack of attention to the work environment" at the center, OSHA regional administrator Charles Adkins announced the "serious" and "repeat" violations for which OSHA proposes a $191,000 penalty.

A 30-ton crane and its 90-foot boom fell through the roof of a celebrated Indianapolis cultural and recreational center on Monday, August 23, crashing into the attic of a YMCA gymnasium and inundating the complex with several inches of water from emergency sprinklers. No one died in the accident. The mishap comes in the wake of new crane safety standards announced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration ("OSHA"), which were described in a recent blog posting.

Indianapolis has been the setting for a number of crane accidents over the years, with Monday's collapse at the Athenaeum center signaling at least the fifth crane accident in the area since 2007.

Claiming that a natural gas explosion in November, 2006, in its ink manufacturing plant destroyed the company, the owners of Danvers, Massachusetts, CAI, Inc., continue to gather evidence for a lawsuit the company has filed against National Grid and its predecessor companies. Those parties supplied gas to the plant. The explosion was felt up to 25 miles away.

CAI filed its complaint in Essex Superior court in December 2009 and has asked for a jury trial. The case is currently in discovery, with both sides having until September to finish gathering evidence.

A power plant explosion that killed six workers and injured 50 others earlier this year in Connecticut highlights the dangers inherent in construction projects and is now the subject of a federal lawsuit filed on August 17. The suit alleges that site contractors failed to exercise due diligence in ensuring that gas at the plant, which was under construction, would not ignite.

Unfortunately, it did, resulting in the multiple deaths and injuries and delaying the project by a year. In the interim, and prior to the suit being filed, OSHA investigators inspected the plant. They issued nearly $17 million in fines recently to several plant contractors, charging them with hundreds of safety violations.

A Chicago firefighter's recent death in a ladder accident while he was battling a restaurant fire serves to highlight what most Americans already know: Working on ladders is often very dangerous business, and falls frequently result in serious and, sometimes, fatal injuries.

Christopher Wheatley , 31, was by all accounts doing what he loved best , simply being a firefighter. "The love of his life was becoming a fireman," said Russell Slagle, a paramedic trainer and friend. "He actually died doing what he loved to do."

Wheatley and other firefighters had responded to a grease-chute fire at a restaurant in the West Loop. Wheatley was carrying both a water pump that weighed more than 40 pounds and a tool for prying open doors when he slipped from a fire-escape ladder. He fell 35 feet and died.

A Pennsylvania roofing company's failure to provide adequate fall protection and other safeguards for its employees working on a residential roof repair operation has resulted in OSHA citations and penalties.

Eastern Roofing Systems Inc., a Moscow, Pennsylvania, company, was subject to an April investigation by OSHA this year as part of a program stressing fall dangers and safety measures in local construction projects. The agency's examination into the company's repair project in Scranton revealed deficiencies in several areas, ranging from serious to willful. OSHA fined Eastern Roofing $53,200 for what amounted in total to four violations.

Recent highly publicized crane accidents in New York and elsewhere serve as a timely backdrop to the subject matter of a recent OSHA news conference discussing new upcoming federal standards to regulate crane and derrick usage throughout the country.

The changes have been long considered. The current rules date back to 1971, and there is a consensus now among members of the construction, safety and insurance industries - as well as among government agencies - that those rules need changing. David Michaels, OSHA assistant secretary of labor, says that the new standard "contains common sense processes and mechanisms that reflect the considerable technologic changes in equipment that have occurred since ... the old rule in 1971."