When Are Safe Work Rules Not Safe Enough?

This story is based on a real court case. The names have been changed, of course, and the dialogue is imagined, what might have been said. The issues and the outcome, however, are all too real. Many workers side-step safety rules every day—maybe some of them are your employees.

At Perfect Produce, potatoes and onions were moved from storage to shipping by conveyors. Freddy’s job was to take bags and boxes of produce off the conveyor and load them onto pallets. But sometimes he also helped clean the work area.

Cleaning under the box conveyor took place several times a day while the conveyor was operating. Although the top of the conveyor was guarded with metal barriers and supports to protect workers against pinch points, the underside was not guarded.

The Accident

Freddy used a mechanic’s creeper to slide under the conveyor and clean up the spilled produce. On this occasion, there were puddles on the floor, so instead of putting his hand in the water to push and help slide him under the conveyor, he reached up with his right hand to push off the frame of the conveyor.

Unfortunately, his arm became caught in the conveyor, and he was unable to free himself using his left hand. He received severe injuries to his right arm and lesser injuries to his left.

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OSHA Cites Employer

When OSHA inspected the plant after the accident, a number of citations were issued for a variety of safety hazards, including violations of the machine guarding standard.

Section 1910.212(a)(1) requires machine guards be provided to protect “the operator and other employees in the machine area from hazards such as those created by point of operation ingoing nip points, [and] rotating parts…”

According to the OSHA compliance officer, the danger zone for nip points on a conveyor is an area within 6 inches of the belt. A worker under an unguarded conveyor on a mechanic’s creeper would be in the danger zone.

Perfect Produce contested the citation, claiming that instead of guarding under the conveyor, it relied on work rules warning employees to “keep hands away from moving equipment parts” and prohibiting anyone from going under the conveyor. The proper procedure was to use a long-handled broom to sweep out fallen produce from under the conveyor.

The Ruling

The Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission let the citation stand. “If employees were told to keep their hands out of machines, such a work rule is nothing more than a general reminder to work safely and is clearly insufficient to prevent an employee’s accidental contact with a conveyor’s rollers where the employee is working 6 inches below a conveyor operating over his head.”

What’s the Point?

Work rules are no substitute for engineering controls, when those are feasible. When they’re not, and you’re relying solely on work rules to protect employees from hazards, those rules had better be effective, explained, emphasized, supervised, and enforced.

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Ready-Made Policies for Your Workplace

It is essential that you have a policy to deal with all the key workplace safety issues, including work rules. Fortunately, BLR’s Essential Safety Policies has a whole section on this crucial safety topic as well as sections on dozens of other essential policy topics.

Each section in the manual provides you with sample strict, standard, and progressive versions of the policy, so that you can determine which approach is best for your workplace and your employees.

You can use these policies “as is” or adapt them to your organization’s particular needs and style. Each section in the manual provides you with comprehensive lists of points to cover if you want to adapt one of the policies or draft your own.

You can incorporate these policies into your employee handbook, too, to make sure all employees are made aware of your workplace rules and requirements.

And Essential Safety Policies doesn’t stop there—it gives you a detailed list of other important things to consider when you implement these policies, such as interrelation with other policies, employee education, legal considerations, and more.

Take these kinds of materials and multiply them by more than two dozen key safety topics, and you’ll know why Essential Safety Policies is such a valuable tool for busy safety professionals. These policies provide a ready-to-modify or use-as-is safety handbook for all your workers, with minimal effort on your part.

The policies are backed by a tutorial on policy writing and essential materials such as handbook receipts. A CD version is also available.

If your organization could benefit from supplementing (or perhaps having for the first time) a complete set of ready to use safety policies, we highly recommend a 30-day, no-cost, no-obligation, look at this program. Go here and we’ll be pleased to send it to you.