OSHA’s Warehouse Safety Emphasis Program: An Analysis
The agency targets distribution and warehousing injuries
Warehousing grown for most of the last decade, with a 5-6% annual growth rate expected for the next 5 years. That level of expansion stresses labor availability and supply chains, but has another implication: safety. In July 2023, OSHA announced what it terms a “new national emphasis” for workplace hazards for warehouses, distribution centers and retail storage facilities. Since nearly 2 million people work in the industry, the agency is interested in reducing injuries across the board.
What are the implications of this emphasis?
The scope of the problem: Based on its analysis, OSHA has designated warehousing employees at higher than average risk. Warehouse worker injury rates are higher than other work in private industry. Some sectors of the industry have injury rates double the national average.
OSHA defines warehousing as “operating facilities for general merchandise, refrigerated goods, and other products. These establishments may also provide logistical services relating to goods distribution.” This is a pretty broad, but accurate description of the sector. Manufacturing operations usually include a warehousing component, while retail back rooms function as miniature warehouses. Last mile distribution has transformed retail so that it frequently operates as a warehouse.
The emphasis program is expected to last for 3 years. The idea is to target and reduce injury rates in the sector. OSHA will attempt to identify root causes to “help align business practices” for better and safer outcomes.
What hazards are the agency targeting?
- Powered industrial trucks and forklifts
- Ergonomic and heat considerations
- Material handling
- Hazardous chemicals
- Slips, trips and falls
- Robotics and automation related injuries.
OSHA: “The most common injuries are musculoskeletal disorders (mainly from overexertion in lifting and lowering) and being struck by powered industrial trucks and other materials handling equipment.”
Forklifts and industrial trucks
Above: in this scenario, where workers are engaged in heavy labor with their backs to the aisle, forklift accident potential is high.Â
Forklifts cause 1% of all industrial accidents, but 10% of all injuries.
The emphasis on this component of warehouse work is no surprise to anyone in the business. Forklifts are always on the agency’s top-10 annual violations list. The dynamics of forklift truck usage make that inevitable. Forklifts are large, heavy, ubiquitous and operated at speed. They interact with storage equipment, heavy pallets, truck docks — and most importantly with people. Forklift deaths happen at a rate of about 100 a year, focused on overturns (22%), workers on foot struck (20%), crushing accidents (16%) and falls from forklifts (9%) according to NIOSH.
While training is key, it may not be enough in some situations.
- Falls are a problem near docks, where safer operations can be enhanced by clamp on dock areas, where trucks can be restrained to help prevent drive-off accidents.
- Speed inhibitors can be implemented to reduce transit speeds, which helps reduce falls.
- Utilize sensors, warning systems and automated gates in conjunction with training.
- Driver training should include mandatory seatbelt use.
- Train on the ways loads and attachments change forklift maneuvering characteristics.
Forklift-pedestrian injuries: a real issue for many industrial operations
Because they account for a high percentage of deaths and injuries, we extensively cover pedestrian-forklift injuries on this area of our website.
Ergonomics and heat-related issues
Warehouse ergonomics is probably the most difficult category OSHA is exploring to quantify. Just about everything involving people in a distribution center touches this aspect. People must pick, pull, carry, walk, place and manipulate items in a warehouse. Sometimes that warehouse is dark, dusty and hot. What that means is that everything that anyone does touches ergonomics in your average warehouse, including the simple act of walking across the floor.
The categories to watch are broadly repetition, force, awkward postures, contact stress and vibration. Work from the general to the specific, reducing the most frequent and severe instances of these issues.
Heat in particular is a focus for OSHA. The agency states that it will conduct inspections if “heat and/or ergonomic hazards are present.”
Resources: warehouse ergonomics
- Ergonomics and Pallet Handling
- Improve Productivity with Ergonomic Storage System Design
- How Heat Saps Warehouse Productivity, Causes Errors and Reduces Retention
Material handling
This is a broad section to consider. It encompasses a large number of processes, systems and equipment, and in many instances is so broad that the agency covers parts of it more incisively in specific areas, such as ergonomics or powered industrial trucks. For instance, the agency specifically looks at forklifts and conveyors as two of the primary categories, both of which have significant specific guidelines elsewhere. OSHA specifically discusses ergonomics in this section, but also has a deeper ergonomics set of guidelines.
Potential areas of focus
- Establish and maintain adequate clearance space around mechanical equipment in aisles, at loading docks, near egress points, and around passages. Keep these areas clear of clutter.
- Improve housekeeping around your storage and egress zones. Keep clutter down. (Read more: 6 Ideas for a Cleaner Warehouse)
- Check guarding and covers for pits, tanks, dock edges and other danger zones.
- Check your dock boards and other walking-working surfaces.
Read more: How to Use Dockboards & Dockplates Safely and Effectively
Slips, trips and falls
Another issue common to most warehouses are the issues of trips, slips and falls. Consider the most problematic and dangerous areas of your facility.
- Dock edges: Any edge more than 48″ tall requires barriers, but a 24″ fall can be just as damaging. Read more: OSHA Requirements for Better Loading Dock Fall Protection
- Pick modules and mezzanines: These are areas of concerns simply due to the heights of potential falls. Read more: Mezzanine, Platform & Pick Module Fall Prevention
- Ladders and maintenance platforms: We recommend using platforms over step ladders whenever possible for assembly and maintenance operations. That isn’t always possible, but it’s best to keep people off ladders in areas where that’s possible.
Above: video of a mezzanine safety gate, which helps prevent exposure to open ledges for workers on elevated platforms.Â
Automation and robotics
It’s no surprise that OSHA would focus on robotics, which is one of the fastest growing technologies in the labor-starved warehousing sector. When correctly specified and implemented, robots can be a safety improvement in and of themselves by removing people from strenuous, repetitive tasks like palletizing, picking and placement on assembly lines. OSHA has no specific standards, but does offer a range of tips and topics.
- Lockout/tagout. Like any mechanical system, robotics requires safe lockout-tagout practices for safe operations.
- Use machine guards to separate moving robots and machinery from workers as part of OSHA & ANSI/RIA R15.06-2014 compliance.
- Interlocks are critical for safety. With an interlock, you ensure that if someone enters a guarded robot, the machine is shut down.
NIOSH provides specific guidance on robotics safety issues, including crushing accident prevention. They provide design tips, which include physical barriers, interlocks/light curtains, barriers, clearance distances, remote diagnostics, illumination and clearly marked facility doors and floors.
“Permanent” changes in workplace safety
OSHA isn’t adding new regulations with this emphasis. Nothing has changed except that the agency clearly sees a growing sector and wants to hone in on its most problematic areas. For warehouse operators, the question isn’t about new regulations — it’s about their existing processes. Take a moment to analyze what you’re doing and where gaps might exist. The agency’s stated goal is to address root causes and align business practices to them. OSHA state plans are required to adopt similar plans if they haven’t already.
OSHA wants warehouses to be “more intentional” about these concerns.Â
For warehousing companies, identifying root causes, revising processes and implementing safety reforms are the clear intention.
Tags: warehousing, distribution centers, fall protection
Scott Stone is Cisco-Eagle's Vice President of Marketing with 35 years of experience in material handling, warehousing and industrial operations. His work is published in multiple industry journals an websites on a variety of warehousing topics. He writes about automation, warehousing, safety, manufacturing and other areas of concern for industrial operations and those who operate them.