OSHA promotes safety stand downs as falls continue

September 13th, 2016 by Dakota Software Staff Industry News

It's well known that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration regularly cites falls as the most common cause of fatalities in the construction field. It's critical that companies outside that industry also recognize the potential for harm that falls from height can cause workers. With a wide variety of industrial tasks requiring employees work above floor level, from the occasional use of ladders to staff who spend significant time on catwalks and other high places, businesses in general and EHS professionals in particular can improve employee safety through OSHA's voluntary stand down for safety efforts.

Recent attention for a longstanding concern
The Voluntary Protection Programs Participants' Association conference in Orlando, Florida, was the site of a presentation by two OSHA administrators on the topic of fall prevention and the federal health and safety regulator's initiative for the same. According to EHS Today, Brian Sturtecky, OSHA's Jacksonville, Florida, area director, spoke to attendees about the need for businesses to work together with OSHA to achieve gains in the realm of fall prevention.

"Things happen - what are you doing to make sure they don't?" Sturtecky said during his talk, according to EHS Today. "[OSHA and the employer] need to work together. If we're not talking about it and you're having trouble, nothing is going to get done."

Part of the discussion centered around the need to recognize that short employee excursions to dangerous heights can be just as hazardous as more extended efforts. Businesses can't allow the convenience of avoiding necessary safety regulations for a quick trip up a ladder or catwalk to infiltrate company culture and create a propensity for injury. To that point, OSHA's voluntary stand downs offer organizations a chance to use existing, free resources to educate staff about the hazards of falls from heights.

The OSHA Fall Prevention Campaign website offers businesses a wide variety of tools to educate workers and management, including posters and fact sheets. As far as the specific considerations for hosting a stand down, EHS professionals should plan ahead, invite employees and other stakeholders, identify unique concerns along with more general ones, share information targeted to those issues and promote the stand down before it happens to increase the chances of success. EHS Today pointed to OSHA's Fall Protection website as containing additional in-depth resources to help businesses create an effective stand down program.