Workplace safety training aims to improve workplace safety and prevent injuries. The first reaction to any workplace injury or incident is to ensure that all employees obtain immediate care. There is also the disruption to productivity to address as well, but this is secondary.

Health and Safety is important because it protects the well being of employers, visitors and customers. Looking after Health and Safety makes good business sense. Workplaces which neglect health and safety risk prosecution, may lose staff, and may increase costs and reduce profitability.

Risks and accidents are prominent especially in a workplaces that involve heavy equipment and machinery. To prevent this, it is stated under Federal OSHA that companies must be compliant with safety standards and should submit safety reports and risk assessments.

Reasons why a good safety culture is important:

1. A company’s most valuable asset is protected — its people
2. Safety programs create productive work environments
3. Injury/death
4. Property damage
5. Positive: worker productivity increases, employees feel they make a difference, increased morale

When a workplace is safe, workers feel more comfortable and confident when they are in that environment. Productivity gets a boost, and profit margins follow suit. Absenteeism also drops when employers take steps to implement an effective safety program.

An effective Accident Prevention Program can benefit the bottom line: lowering injury record may reduce the cost of your insurance coverage; every workplace employee accident results in direct and indirect costs. The indirect cost of accidents can have the greatest impact on profits.

Direct costs, such as workers’ compensation benefits and medical costs, are obvious. Indirect costs are, to some extent, hidden. They include: direct time loss – time lost by those injured as well as other employees and supervisors; indirect time loss – time lost hiring and training new or replacement employees, preparing reports, attending hearings or rescheduling production; and contingency costs – inability to fill orders, loss of customers, and employee good will. An effective accident prevention program can substantially reduce these indirect costs.

Investigating a worksite incident— a fatality, injury, illness, or close call— provides employers and workers the opportunity to identify hazards in their operations and shortcomings in their safety and health programs. Most importantly, it enables employers and workers to identify and implement the corrective actions necessary to prevent future incidents.

Incident investigations that focus on identifying and correcting root causes, not on finding fault or blame, also improve workplace morale and increase productivity, by demonstrating an employer’s commitment to a safe and healthful workplace.  They are often conducted by a supervisor, but to be most effective, these investigations should include managers and employees working together, since each bring different knowledge, understanding and perspectives to the investigation.

In conducting an incident investigation, the team must look beyond the immediate causes of an incident. It is far too easy, and often misleading, to conclude that carelessness or failure to follow a procedure alone was the cause of an incident. To do so fails to discover the underlying or root causes of the incident, and therefore fails to identify the systemic changes and measures needed to prevent future incidents. When a shortcoming is identified, it is important to ask why it existed and why it was not previously addressed.

 

Outdoor operations conducted in hot weather and direct sun, such as construction, landscaping, emergency response operations, and hazardous waste site activities, increase the risk of heat-related illness in exposed workers.

Every year, thousands of workers become sick from occupational heat exposure, and some even die. These illnesses and deaths are preventable.

When a person works in a hot environment, the body must get rid of excess heat to maintain a stable internal temperature. It does this mainly through circulating blood to the skin and through sweating.

If the body cannot get rid of excess heat, it will store it. When this happens, the body’s core temperature rises and the heart rate increases. As the body continues to store heat, the person begins to lose concentration and has difficulty focusing on a task, may become irritable or sick, and often loses the desire to drink. The next stage is most often fainting and even death if the person is not cooled down.

Excessive exposure to heat can cause a range of heat-related illnesses, from heat rash and heat cramps to heat exhaustion and heat stroke. Heat stroke can result in death and requires immediate medical attention.

Exposure to heat can also increase the risk of injuries because of sweaty palms, fogged-up safety glasses, dizziness, and burns from hot surfaces or steam.

Workers exposed to hot and humid conditions outdoors are at risk of heat-related illness, especially those doing heavy work tasks or using bulky or non-breathable protective clothing and equipment. Some workers might be at greater risk than others if they have not built up a tolerance to hot conditions, or if they have certain health conditions.

Factors that put workers at greater risk:

Environmental:

• High temperature and humidity
• Radiant heat sources
• Contact with hot objects
• Direct sun exposure (no shade)
• Limited air movement (no wind, ventilation or no breeze)

Job-Specific:

• Physical exertion
• Use of bulky or non-breathable protective clothing and equipment

When do you know if it’s too hot?

• The temperature rises
• Humidity increases
• The sun gets stronger
• There is no air movement
• No controls are in place to reduce the impacts of equipment that radiates heat
• Protective clothing or gear is worn
• Work is strenuous

Heat-related illnesses can be prevented. Important ways to reduce heat exposure and the risk of heat-related illness include engineering controls, such as air conditioning and ventilation, that make the work environment cooler, and work practices such as work/rest cycles, drinking water often, and providing an opportunity for workers to build up a level of tolerance to working in the heat.

The heat index, which takes both temperature and humidity into account, is a useful tool for outdoor workers and employers.

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Deadly Danger # 1—Forklift Turnovers
Close to one out of every four fatalities occurs when a forklift tips over. Forklifts can easily tip if they are overloaded, if the load is not well balanced, or if they travel with the forks too high.

Deadly Danger #2—Nearby Worker Struck by Forklift
Forklifts and pedestrians can often be a deadly mix.
Deadly Danger # 3—Victim Crushed by Forklift
The average forklift weighs several thousand pounds. As a result, 16 percent of forklift fatalities occur when victims are crushed by the vehicle.
Deadly Danger # 4—Falls from Forklifts
It is not always the case that a victim is crushed following a fall from a forklift. The fall alone may be fatal. Of fatal forklift accidents, 9 percent are the result of falls.
Deadly Danger # 5—Failure to Inspect or Perform Proper Maintenance
As with all equipment, forklifts have to be inspected regularly and properly maintained.

OSHA penalty amounts adjusted for inflation as of Jan. 13, 2017
Type of Violation                                  Penalty
Serious
Other-Than-Serious
Posting Requirements                      $12,675 per violation
Failure to Abate                                   $12,675 per day beyond the abatement date
Willful or Repeated                            $126,749 per violation

State Plan States
States that operate their own Occupational Safety and Health Plans are required to adopt maximum penalty levels that are at least as effective as Federal OSHA’s.