You probably noticed there’s a new, fresh, updated look to EHSToday.com, and if you receive the EHS Today print publication, you’ll see some changes there as well.It’s all part of a corporate effort to create a recognizable “brand” among the web sites and magazines in our Industry and Infrastructure Group, of which EHS Today is a part. While we still have our own names, content and missions, EHS Today and its sister brands IndustryWeek, New Equipment Digest, Material Handling & Logistics, American Machinist, American Machinist, Foundry Management & Technology and Forging Magazine are dedicated to providing high-value information to our audiences.Here at EHS Today, we’ve been looking forward to these changes for a long time:EHSToday.com: When you navigate through the new and improved EHSToday.com, you’ll notice a cleaner look. Things aren’t flashing and moving all over the home page. Designed to provide an improved user experience, our new website features infinite scrolling and faster page loading. What’s more, with a responsive design, the new website is optimized for mobile devices, meaning it’s much easier to access and read on tablets and smartphones. This is a great fit for many of you who are constantly on the go.You’ll find the latest news in the left column (or rail, if you’re a techie) under the RECENT heading. You’ll notice this content changing just about every day. In the center, you’ll find TOP STORIES, which includes content the EHS Today editors handpicked for our audience. On the right rail, you’ll find a green box that has a link to upcoming webinars as well as special events we think might be important to you.The most important component on the home page is the dropdown MENU next to our new logo. (The techie guys call it a “hamburger menu.” Not sure why, but it makes me hungry every time they say it.) Take a little time to explore what’s there. You’ll find links to our topic pages, archived and upcoming webinars, the Safety Leadership Conference, the America’s Safest Companies awards, latest headlines (news) and so much more!EHS Today in print: With the goal to refresh, not necessarily reinvent, the look of our print product, we tweaked our logo design and implemented a new color palette — aiming for something more contemporary and cleaner-looking.The one thing that hasn’t changed is the mission of EHS Today: To be the leading voice for environment, health and safety information, driving a dialogue for our readers about safety leadership, risk management, occupational safety, industrial hygiene, sustainability, employee health and wellness, environmental management, productivity, corporate responsibility and business continuity and how it all is interrelated. EHS Today provides comprehensive coverage of these topics, with an emphasis on building world-class safety management systems and inspiring transformational safety leadership. We will do this by providing high-value information to our audience through a mix of news items, short- and long-form articles, special reports, photo galleries, webinars, white papers, educational events and more.I hope you find the new EHSToday.com to be a useful tool as you strive every day to keep employees and facilities healthy and safe, provide value to your employer and further your knowledge of environment, health and safety.
The Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Administration is investigating the case of a 42-year-old construction worker who fell four stories to his death on July 22. According to reports, Fausto Flores was cutting a wooden handrail at a construction site when he fell.According to OSHA in 1926.501(b)(1) – "Unprotected sides and edges" – “Each employee on a walking/working surface (horizontal and vertical surface) with an unprotected side or edge which is 6 feet (1.8 m) or more above a lower level shall be protected from falling by the use of guardrail systems, safety net systems or personal fall arrest systems.Preliminary reports indicate there was no guardrail or personal fall arrest system in use by Flores.An investigation by the Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Administration is expected to take six to eight weeks to complete.According to Chris Cannon, the spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development, there have been 21 workplace fatalities in the state in 2017, and nearly half – 10 worker deaths – have been related to construction.Briona Arradondo, a reporter for Nashville’s WSVM (News4) http://www.wsmv.com asked Cannon what the employer could have done to prevent Flores’ death. He told her that the use of a guardrail system might have saved Flores’ life."They must go along that edge and put a guardrail up all the way around there, so there are no unused edges they could possibly fall off,” Cannon told Arradondo.In 1926.501(b)(2)(i), OSHA requires that “Each employee who is constructing a leading edge 6 feet (1.8 m) or more above lower levels shall be protected from falling by guardrail systems, safety net systems or personal fall arrest systems.”The agency does make an exception if “the employer can demonstrate that it is infeasible or creates a greater hazard to use these systems.” In those cases, “the employer shall develop and implement a fall protection plan which meets the requirements of paragraph (k) of 1926.502.”The agency further states: “There is a presumption that it is feasible and will not create a greater hazard to implement at least one of the above-listed fall protection systems. Accordingly, the employer has the burden of establishing that it is appropriate to implement a fall protection plan which complies with 1926.502(k) for a particular workplace situation, in lieu of implementing any of those systems.”
In a report published in 1928 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), Dr. Harrison S. Martland coined the phrase “punch drunk” to describe the neurological symptoms exhibited by boxers who were exposed to repetitive head trauma in the ring. Eventually, the condition described by Martland was named dementia pugilistica, and now is known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). A large team of researchers have evaluated the brains of 202 deceased former football players who played high school, college, semiprofessional and professional football and found that the brains of 177 players (87 percent) showed signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Of the 14 deceased players who only played in high school, three showed mild cases of CTE. However, the longer the players were involved in the game and higher the level of performance, the more likely they were to have developed more severe cases of CTE.“Clinicopathological Evaluation of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in Players of American Football,” published in the July 25 issue of JAMA, found that of the 111 deceased NFL players examined, 110 had brains that exhibited signs of CTE (99 percent), a progressive neurological condition that results from repeated head trauma. The condition can result in mood swings, depression, anxiety, feelings of hopelessness, violent outbursts, cognitive impairment and dementia and only can be diagnosed by an autopsy after death.The median age of death for players with mild CTE was 44 years. Researchers noted that the most common cause of death for study participants with mild CTE was suicide (27 percent). The median age of participants with severe CTE pathology was 71 years, and the most common cause of death (47 percent) was neurodegenerative – dementia- and parkinsonian-related.“Nearly all of the former NFL players in this study had CTE pathology,” wrote the researchers, “and this pathology was frequently severe. These findings suggest that CTE may be related to prior participation in football and that a high level of play may be related to substantial disease burden.”They went on to say that several other football-related factors – such as age at first exposure to football, duration of play, player position, cumulative hits and linear and rotational acceleration of hits – could influence CTE risk and disease severity.The NFL, responding to a request for comment from CNN, said the organization will continue to work with “a wide range of experts to improve the health of current and former NFL athletes,” and added that many unanswered questions “relating to the cause, incidence and prevalence of long-term effects of head trauma such as CTE” remain.
A roofer who was criminally charged twice in 13 months for working illegally as a contractor has been sentenced to 15 days behind bars. Peter Daniel Yeaman, 57, pleaded guilty Thursday in Mason County (Washington) District Court to a gross misdemeanor charge of unregistered contracting. Judge Victoria Meadows imposed the jail time, and ordered Yeaman to pay $1,000 in penalties and repay his victim $5,000.Since 2013, Washington’s Department of Labor & Industries (L&I) has cited Yeaman nine times for unregistered contracting and twice for not obtaining a permit before altering a manufactured home. State law requires contractors to register with L&I, which confirms they have a business license, liability insurance and a bond to provide some recourse for consumers if problems arise. It’s illegal to work, offer, subcontract, submit bids or advertise as a contractor without being registered.L&I suspended his contractor registration in November 2012 for failing to pay his workers’ comp premiums. He now owes L&I nearly $180,000 for unpaid contracting and safety infractions and workers’ comp premiums and penalties. The department is continuing efforts to collect the debt.For the current case, the judge required Yeaman to begin serving the jail time no later than Aug. 9. If Yeaman doesn’t comply with the sentence or commits a crime in the next two years, he could face up to 349 more days in jail.This is the second time the Washington Attorney General’s Office has prosecuted Yeaman based on a L&I investigation into him and his company, Southgate Roofing, of Belfair, Wash.Cashed Check for New Roofing Job on Same Day as Guilty PleaIn the current case, Yeaman was not registered as a contractor when he agreed to reroof a house in Grapeview, south of Bremerton, and cashed a $5,000 check for the job on Nov. 23, 2015.That was the very same day that he pleaded guilty and was sentenced in an older case on one count of unregistered contracting and one felony count of doing business after his workers’ compensation coverage was revoked. The sentence required, in part, that he not work as an unregistered contractor for two years.“It’s hard to believe the audacity of this defendant,” said Elizabeth Smith, assistant director of L&I’s Fraud Prevention & Labor Standards. “This is an especially serious case of someone who knew he was breaking the law for a second time, and chose to rip off a customer.”In the 2015 case, Yeaman accepted the $5,000 check, and told the homeowner that the job would cost an additional $1,379. He said he would start the roofing job as soon as the rain “let up,” charging papers said.That was in early December. The rain let up and months passed. The homeowner kept contacting Yeaman, who said in May 2016 that it would be a few more weeks before he could start. The homeowner then contacted L&I.In the previous criminal case, Yeaman’s company started a roofing job in May 2014, but the owner of that home learned he was unregistered and asked for his money back. Yeaman never repaid him, and the owner hired a registered contractor to finish the job, costing the consumer $4,500 more than anticipated.