Texas Tops Workplace Fatality Ranks

Texas ranks highest for fatal workplace injuries, with 578 reported cases in 2022, the latest year of available data, according to analysis by Expertise.com.
The state also ranks among the top five for the highest number of non-fatal workplace injuries and illnesses.
Of particular note, the state’s rural workers reported more occupational injuries/illnesses and more days missed due to injuries/illnesses than urban workers.
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California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health has long required driverless tractors to have an operator stationed in the vehicles.
Now it says it is rescinding its opposition. Here’s why and what it envisions for possible regulatory reform.
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Artco-Bell has been fined $257,000 by OSHA after the Texas school furniture maker was determined to have been able to prevent an employee’s severe and permanent hand and arm injuries had it installed required machine guards.
The company was cited for 24 serious safety and health violations stemming from an April 2024 accident that occurred while a worker was using a garden hose to clean machine rollers. The hose became caught in the rollers, pulling the worker’s arm into the machine and leading to the injury.
In addition to the machine guard violations, OSHA inspectors found Artco-Bell exposed workers to respirable crystalline silica hazards.
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OSHA found that “the operator of three Massachusetts waterproofing contracting companies could have prevented an employee from suffering fatal injuries… when part of the foundation broke and fell on the worker in a 5- to-6-foot-deep trench beneath the foundation of a Hanson residence,” the agency said in a statement on Friday.
The employer, Aleckssandro Tomaz Pereira, of Woburn, operating as Boston Concrete Corp. LLC, VMT Contractor LLC and Boston Concrete and Remodelling LLC, face a proposed $283,115 penalty for two willful and six serious violations.
“Aleckssandro Tomaz Pereira should never have placed workers in this trench until the excavation and the building’s foundation were guarded against collapse, workers were properly trained, water was removed from the trench and an exit ladder was provided,” OSHA Area Director James Mulligan, of Braintree, said in the statement. “This tragedy was entirely preventable.”
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Chapman Corporation of Washington, Pennsylvania and the Gettysburg Foundation in Gettysburg have been awarded the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry’s 2024 Governor’s Award for Safety Excellence (GASE).
The highly competitive award recognizes outstanding workplace safety programs and practices.
Chapman is a family and woman-owned mechanical, electrical, and civil contractor that has achieved over one million hours worked with no lost-time to injury in three years.
The Gettysburg Foundation, which operates several historical sites including the Gettysburg National Military Park Museum and Visitor Center, has maintained a zero-incident rate for more than three years.
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