Home
Share |

Content about Confined space

April 22, 2013
OSHA Fines New Jersey Laundry $219,000 for Reported Safety Violations

NORTH BERGEN, N.J. — Prestige Industries LLC, dba Prestige, faces nine repeat or serious safety and health violations: OSHA

NORTH BERGEN, N.J. — The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has cited Prestige Industries LLC, doing business as Prestige, for safety violations found at its commercial laundry facility in North Bergen.

A complaint initiated OSHA’s October 2012 investigation and resulted in $219,000 in proposed penalties.

The agency identified four repeat violations, carrying a $185,500 penalty, based on the company’s alleged failure to protect workers from unguarded machinery, establish a lockout/tagout program and procedures for controlling energy sources, and provide energy control training for workers who perform maintenance on machines.

A repeat violation is issued when an employer previously has been cited for the same or a similar violation of a standard, regulation, rule or order at any other facility in federal enforcement states within the last five years. The same violations were cited in 2012 following a worker’s death after being caught in an unguarded machine at the company’s Bayshore, N.Y., facility, OSHA says.

The agency also noted five serious violations, with a $33,500 penalty, that were due to alleged electrical hazards; an inadequate confined-space program and failure to identify permit-required confined spaces; and no hazard communication program, training and material safety data sheets.

OSHA says a serious citation is issued when there is substantial probability that death or serious physical harm could result from a hazard about which the employer knew or should have known.

“The safety hazards present at this facility pose serious risks to workers and must be immediately corrected,” says Kris Hoffman, director of OSHA’s Parsippany Area Office. “OSHA will continue to hold employers legally accountable when they fail to provide safe workplaces.”

Prestige, based in Jersey City, has 15 business days from receipt of the citations to comply, request an informal conference with the OSHA area director, or contest the citations and proposed penalties before the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission.

The citations can be viewed here.

March 25, 2013
OSHA Fines New Jersey Laundry $165,000 for Safety and Health Violations

PATERSON, N.J. — Brite Services Inc., dba Star Laundry, faces 39 serious safety and health violations: OSHA

PATERSON, N.J. — The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has cited Brite Services Inc., doing business as Star Laundry, for 39 serious safety and health violations found at its commercial laundry facility in Paterson, the agency reports.

Inspectors were prompted by a complaint alleging the company would not allow workers to leave the building during an emergency. Proposed penalties total $164,700.

OSHA found electrical hazards and an obstructed and improperly marked exit route, the agency says. Some of the alleged violations include:

  • Allowing employees to potentially be struck by traffic while transporting laundry bins from one building to another while crossing a public street.
  • Failing to provide a cover and guardrails for open pits, and a handrail for the stairway.
  • Failing to evaluate the workplace for permit-required confined spaces, to post signs informing workers of confined spaces, and to develop a written confined-space permit program.
  • Failing to establish an energy control program for performing maintenance/servicing work.
  • Failing to train power industrial truck operators, and to take powered industrial trucks in need of repair out of service
  • Failing to insulate or cover steam pipes less than 7 feet from the floor
  • Failing to properly guard machines, implement a hearing conservation program for workers exposed to noise levels at 88-89 decibels, ensure safety goggle usage, provide an unblocked eyewash station, develop a written hazard communication program, and provide hazard communication training.

“The vast number and range of safety and health hazards observed by OSHA at this facility indicates the lack of a functioning safety and health management system,” says Lisa Levy, director of OSHA’s area office in Hasbrouck Heights, N.J. “Each employer is responsible for ensuring a safe and healthful work environment, which Brite Services did not do. This company has the opportunity now to educate itself, correct these hazards and protect its workers.”

Brite Services has 15 business days from receipt of the citations to comply, request an informal conference with OSHA, or contest the citations and proposed penalties before the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission.

The citations can be viewed here.

January 23, 2009
TRSA Posts Confined-Spaces Manual on Safety Website

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The Textile Rental Services Association (TRSA) has posted a Permit-Required Confined Spaces (PRCS) Policies and Procedures Manual, the third in a series of safety manuals designed to help the textile services industry enhance workplace safety, at www.safetrsa.org.

June 18, 2008
ALM Course to Offer OSHA Guidance Specific to Laundries

RICHMOND, Ky. — Administrators and managers of laundry processing facilities always have safety on their minds. As industry publications announce the latest injury or fatality, management scrambles to assess their operation’s vulnerability and evaluate their policies in the fear that their laundry could be next.

May 12, 2008
OSHA Proposes Hefty Fines Against Sodexo for Alleged Safety Violations

BUFFALO, N.Y. — The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is proposing fines exceeding $77,000 against Sodexo’s (formerly Sodexho) industrial laundry here for inadequate employee safeguards, the U.S. Department of Labor agency announced in a press release May 5.

OSHA cited Sodexo for 13 alleged repeat and serious violations of safety and health standards following inspections that began in January in response to employee complaints, the agency says.

January 15, 2008
Hearing Calls for Safety After Worker Deaths

NEWARK, N.J. — The deaths of two Linden laundry workers, overcome by chemical fumes last month while cleaning a tank, yesterday brought a congressional subcommittee to that city to hear calls for empowering workers to help police workplace safety — and imposing tougher sanctions on employers who endanger the lives of their workers.