OSHA cites Hurst, Texas, flooring company for hazards after worker falls off balcony at Fort Worth job site

Employer name: Subfloor Systems Inc., Hurst, Texas

Citations issued: Jan. 20, 2016

Investigation findings: The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration began an inspection on July 29, 2015, when a worker required hospitalization after falling off a balcony at a Fort Worth commercial construction site. Following the inspection, OSHA issued citations for one willful and one serious violation. The company’s failure to ensure employees use fall protection resulted in the willful violation, and failing to train workers in recognizing and avoiding fall hazards, specifically in a language that each employee understands, led to the serious violation. 

Proposed Penalties: $66,990

Quote: “Subfloor Systems put its workers in harm’s way and exposed them to preventable fall injuries. Employers are responsible for providing training and fall protection,” said Josh Bernstein, OSHA’s acting area director in Fort Worth, Texas. “Subfloor Systems did neither. The company must take corrective action immediately before another worker needlessly suffers injury or worse because of its neglect.”

Background: Since Jan. 1, 2015, OSHA record-keeping requirements obligate employers to report within 24 hours to OSHA the hospitalization of one or more employees, an amputation or an eye loss. 

Link to the citations: http://www.osha.gov/ooc/citations/SubfloorSystem1080813.pdf

Information: Subfloor Systems, a flooring and concrete company, employs about 62 workers at its headquarters in Hurst, Texas. The company has 15 business days from receipt of their citations to comply, request an informal conference with OSHA’s area director, or contest the citations and penalties before the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission.

To ask questions; obtain compliance assistance; file a complaint or report amputations, eye loss, workplace hospitalizations, fatalities or situations posing imminent danger to workers, the public should call OSHA's toll-free hotline at 800-321-OSHA (6742) or the agency’s Fort Worth Area Office at 817-581-7303. For more information, visit http://www.osha.gov.