The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has fined PM Engineered Solutions Inc., a Watertown, Conn.-based metal fabrication company, after one of its employees was electrocuted repairing a portable water heater on July 14.
According to a release by DOL, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) investigated the incident and found there were not sufficient safeguards to protect people against being electrocuted, as well as other hazards on the job site including electrical, chemical, fall and mechanical hazards. PM Engineered Solutions was cited for 40 serious and eight other-than-serious safety and health standards and will be fined $236,201.
“This employee lost his life due to the employer’s failure to implement required energy control procedures,” OSHA Area Director Dale Varney said. “Of equal concern is the broad cross-section of hazards throughout the facility. Left uncorrected, they expose employees to being crushed, caught in moving machine parts, burned, chemical exposures, falling and being unable to exit the workplace promptly in the event of an emergency, such as a fire or explosion.”
The release stated that OSHA found that the company did not develop procedures to lockout a water heater’s power source, as well as not provide lockout training to the employee who died. Energy control procedures were reportedly also not checked regularly.
The lockout/tagout is also called hazardous energy control, which is to prevent an unexpected startup or release of a stored energy source in the machine that can result in injury or death.
Other hazards that were found at the plant include: 62 instances of inadequately guarded machinery; a variety of safety violations including exposed live electrical parts; open or unlabeled tanks of hazardous chemicals; lack of personal protection equipment; uninspected equipment; unsecured compressed gas cylinders; missing or inadequate exit signing; failure to evaluate a fork truck operator; and a lack of a permit for a confined space program.
According to a report by the STL News, PM Engineered Solutions has 15 business days from the date of the citation and penalties to comply.
