The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has announced the 10 most frequently cited workplace safety violations for fiscal year 2017. While none of the items on the list were especially surprising, all types of violations should give you cause to stop and think about how well you’ve done with safety in those areas.

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We help clients with structural mezzanines and rack supported systems in a range of facilities.

Mezzanine options range from professionally manufactured to home-made to local fabrication shop to professional contractors. If you have a mezzanine or storage platform custom fabricated, you need to be sure your contractor is complying with OSHA & local safety regulations, particularly on guard railing, stairs and gates. If your fabricator doesn’t routinely work with mezzanines, this is something you’ll have to do on your own. The best policy is to look at established vendors if you don’t want to micro-manage the details of building permits, code compliance, and OSHA’s blessings. Here’s a breakdown of the handrail issues you might run into:

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If you are a safety or EHS director, you probably knew this was coming: starting January 21, 2017 certain companies will be required to electronically submit their injury and illness data. This is data these companies should already be keeping, so the requirement isn’t so much about new record keeping as it is updated methodology.

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Safety has always been important to warehousing and manufacturing, but in recent years, the emphasis has grown – and it’s no wonder.

The forklift has always been at or near the top of these concerns, due to its common use. There are nearly 900,000 forklifts in use in the United State. Forklift accidents are always in OSHA’s top ten  safety violations lists. But the reality is that despite the dangers they can present, forklifts are indispensable for material handling operations.

We sat down with Donald Prater, Cisco-Eagle’s Safety Division Manager, to discuss some common questions involving ZoneSafe, a proximity detection technology that helps alert drivers that pedestrians are nearby as they do their work.

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In manufacturing & distribution, safety is an area of top concern, for both the protection of workers and financial ramifications for companies. We spent some time at ProMat with Kelly Kamlager from Ladder Industries to examine the importance of safety and compliance for industrial companies.

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The question people often have when they design warehouse work flow is, “how much can we lift by hand?” The answer to that question isn’t cut-and-dried. It all depends on the angle, the approach, the frequency, weight and reaching/twisting requirements.

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Take a look at your conveyor – do you think it’s safe? Are there sufficient guardrails? Are operators wearing loose clothing? Are visitors allowed near running lines? Because conveyor seems safe at a glance, it’s an often-overlooked hazard. Used correctly, of course, it is a safe way to increase productivity.

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In an industrial environment, intersections can be dangerous. With fast-moving workers who are busy and probably distracted, and fast-moving forklifts that may have loads elevated that can obstruct the driver’s view, corners, ends of rack rows, and intersections can be the cause of many accidents. Whether it’s a worker walking and carrying a load, or a forklift on its way to the next pick, the chances of collisions, injuries, and damages are greater at intersections than most anywhere else. What are your options when it comes to making your intersections safer?

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OSHA has recently released a guide to safety incentives, disincentives, and reporting issues. It’s worth a quick read if you manage a manufacturing, warehousing, or industrial facility.

This document focuses on reporting/non-reporting workplace injury issues. OSHA says that “Reporting a work-related injury or illness is a core employee right, and retaliating against a worker for reporting an injury or illness is illegal discrimination under section 11(c).”  Of course, smart companies want to know if there are unsafe conditions or practices. But what if your safety rewards program is discouraging employees from reporting incidents, or even near-misses?

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The National Safety Council has released its list of the top 10 OSHA safety violations for 2009, and there is plenty to chew on if you are running a warehouse, manufacturing facility, military installation, or distribution center. In fact, several of these categories drop directly into the laps of material handling operations. Worse news: violations are up over 30 percent.

The list is as follows:

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