ECN Forum Forums Safety Discussion and News Occupational Safety Discussion This is why OSHA is needed!

First let me commend you on your actions! The situation you were placed in on that night is the most difficult one someone in your position can be placed into and you did your best. As what has happened after that night tells me this is a case for OSHA to investigate. I say this, not because I believe OSHA should be called to handle company matters, but if what you are telling us is 100% of the entire picture, then people, such as your supervisor tend to not lie as easy when OSHA is asking the questions as there are consequences far above what the company can hand down.

Bryan

Friday they said after reviewing the situation they would drop our level from a 3 to a 2. I still refused to sign the paper. I told them its just wrong. The supervisor was put on the floor with no lock out training. He was told to lock it out 2 times. What were we suppose to do tackle him. And i told them if he is lying and telling them that he didn't know it was live and i never told him that (which several people heard me) then i said he is stupider than i thought for putting his hands in there without checking first and is going to get someone hurt. They are in my opinion and interputation of osha severly lacking in there LOTO training and compliance. I have never seen any documents on the procedures for LOTO on any pcs of equipment in the shop. And there trainning is 2 5min videos.

[This message has been edited by jlhmaint (edited 09-20-2003).]

This is the write up i recieved word for word:

Description of infraction: Associate standard of conduct: Failed to follow established saftey rules.

Relative information:

On the evening of 9/2/2003, name omitted removed and replaced a blown fuse in a lighting power panel disconnect. The panel was not locked out or tagged out properly. The panel was infact energized with electrical current carrying loads still attached to it. The removal of the blown fuse did not cause an arc to occur since the fuse was actually blown and it was not passing current. If the wrong fuse had been pulled, an arc would have occured. When the new fuse was installed an arc occured due to the circuit being energized and loaded and the new fuse passing current through it. The new fuse could have exploded in his face due to the current(load) it may have been carrying causing loss of life or limb or other serious injuries to himself or others in the area. Name omitted(me) knew that the panel was still energized as he observed name omitted(boss) remove/replace the fuse and did not intervene in any way.

I refused to sign and wrote i intervened twice by telling him to shut it down. They know how we feel. We don't know what he got out of this but he has yet to be suspended and is still in charge. He was punished and we are assuming that he got no more than a level 3 as well.

jlh,
Why is there no mention of the arc-flash that would occur, should there be a "dead short-circuit" on the circuit concerned?.
I would NEVER replace a fuse without having tested the circuit first with a Megger, between Phase and Earth!.

I will say it again It is the everyone’s responsibility to check for power before commencing work whether told of the power condition or not.If this was in fact the point of disconnect how could it be locked out since he was working on it?He is the leader, and in a normal plant is charged with making sure you follow procedure. How in the hell can the company put a untrained monkey in charge of safety. If things had played out the way it is written up you are still not to blame I believe even if he was told it was de-energized I is his responsibility to take 30 seconds to check power.He could even get out of it by saying he was not trained and drop it in his bosses lap. This letter simply shows that the manager himself is clueless. Tell him to call the AHJ inspection dept and get directives. I ve seen the aftermath of almost the same accident and In the end it was the electricians fault because he did no follow commonsense precautions. If it is not a qualified electrician and a “competent person” it falls on management because managment classifies him as so. In my plant after the training sessions we have to sign a paper stating that we understood the course and to show management attempted to give training. If you don’t sign it you can’t work in the plant until you take the course and are "competent". Don’t they do this everywhere?

[This message has been edited by frank (edited 09-22-2003).]

OK,
I have not been looking at this forum for awhile. So what is going on with this now? If you want to e-mail me for advice, you can e-mail me at skschneiderNOSPAM@adelphia.net Just take out the NOSPAM part. I have been told by the spam police to do this so people cannot get your e-mail.

I know somethings about safety and I might be able to help you.

Scott

it is justifying goverment intervention

all well and fine....

too bad Grasso, Lay ,Milliken as well as other thugs do not fall under OSHA regs eh?