There are four new workplace fatalities in California. Two are from falls. In Tracy, an employee of Tracy Commerce Center was killed in an 80-foot fall inside a silo at the former Holly Sugar facility. The employee attempted to climb out of the silo when he slipped and fell. It is undetermined yet what the …
Safety professionals and employer representatives continue to question the assumptions underlying Cal/OSHA’s proposed revisions to its lead standards. At the October meeting of the Standards Board, they pressed the agency to justify the dramatic revisions proposed for both the lead permissible exposure limit and action level. And they again protested what they assert was a …
A Cal/OSHA requirement on construction personnel hoists is hopelessly outdated, so says a large provider of scaffolding services and hoisting equipment. It contends the requirement is hindering its ability to serve clients. BrandSafway, based in Atlanta, Georgia, petitioned the Standards Board to revise Construction Safety Orders §1604.21 to match the latest version of the American …
The Cal/OSHA Standards Board has granted a variance to Calistoga’s Sterling Vineyards to install a high-tech gondola system that surpasses outdated Title 8 requirements. The Board has granted similar variances to several other employers in recent years. Sterling, owned by Treasury Wine Estates Americas Co., is installing a 2,816-foot detachable grip gondola tramway at the …
The California Court of Appeal recently granted a motion by attorneys representing Granite Construction that an opinion recently issued by the Third Appellate District be certified for publication. The Finch, Thornton, Baird law firm based in San Diego filed the request for publication. The firm represents the McCarthy Building and coordinated the move with the …
There are six new workplace fatalities in California, four of them from falls. In San Francisco, the owner of Tritec Construction suffered a fall of about 14 feet from a scaffold and died a day later of severe head trauma. In Fontana, an employee of Royal Roof Corp. was working on the roof of a …
Associated General Contractors of California recently announced the winners of its 2023 Construction Safety Excellence Awards, feting one individual and eight companies. But that’s not the whole story. More than two dozen general contractors and specialty companies competed in this year’s awards, as well as a dozen individuals. The entrants represented employers with excellent safety …
Following Cal-OSHA Reporter’s October 13th article, “More Lead Changes – Anything Big?” (p. 13881), Cal/OSHA’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health took issue with our coverage by pointing out what it says are “errors and inaccuracies” in the reporting. Here’s what we reported and DOSH’s response. We note that DOSH and the Standards Board published …