Federal agency decisions, searchable in plain English.
Workplace-safety cases from the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) and mine-safety cases from the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission (FMSHRC), each with a plain-English summary, the standards it cites, and whether it counts as precedent. More agencies are coming.
No decisions match these filters
Try a different search term or clear the filters.
Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel Corp., Wheeling Corrugating Company, Division of Wheeling-Pittsburgh Corporation
Older-crane guarding citations are vacated
These consolidated cases involved electrical and moving-part guarding requirements for overhead and gantry cranes. The Commission held that the cited requirements were design specifications that were mandatory for cranes installed on or after August 31, 1971, but advisory for older cranes. Because…
Thomco, Inc.
Commission declines review and affirms the ALJ decision
This is a short procedural order in the consolidated cases of Thomco, Inc. (Docket Nos. 76-1498 and 76-1402). The case came to the Commission on its own (sua sponte) order for review, but neither party filed objections, a petition for discretionary review, or any expression of dissatisfaction with…
Colfry Brothers Terrazzo Contractors, Inc.
Commission declines review and affirms the ALJ decision
This is a short procedural order in a case involving Colfry Brothers Terrazzo Contractors, Inc. The case came to the Commission on its own (sua sponte) order for review, but neither party filed objections, a petition for discretionary review, or any expression of dissatisfaction with the…
Tom Stewart Construction Co., Inc.
Commission declines review and lets the judge's decision stand
This is a short Commission order in a case involving Tom Stewart Construction Co., a construction employer. After an Administrative Law Judge ruled on the case, a Commissioner brought it up for review on the Commission's own motion (a sua sponte order for review). Neither side filed objections or…
Otis Elevator Company
Elevator-car top was not a floor or platform requiring guardrails
Two Otis Elevator employees stood on top of an elevator car while painting counterweight rails during installation. OSHA alleged a repeated violation because the car top lacked a standard railing. The Commission held that the surface was the roof of the elevator car, not an open-sided floor or a…
M. K. Binkley Construction Company
OSHA did not prove a feasible roof fall-protection method
M. K. Binkley Construction employees installed roof decking near an edge with a possible fall of 15 to 20 feet and wore no fall-protection equipment. OSHA proposed safety belts and lanyards connected to lifelines attached to the walls or to a new frame around the roof perimeter. The Commission held…
Paramount Plumbing & Heating Co.
Two shared-site hazards affirmed, open-floor item vacated
Paramount Plumbing worked as a subcontractor on a New York City high-rise project. The Commission vacated an open-floor guardrail item because OSHA did not prove that Paramount's employees would enter the fall-hazard zones on the seventh or twenty-ninth floors. It affirmed items involving ladder…
Clarence Brown, d/b/a Brown's Contracting
First-aid item vacated, ladder and scaffold violations stand
Brown's Contracting was reroofing and residing a residential building when OSHA cited first-aid, ladder, and scaffold conditions. The Commission reviewed the first-aid item and held that OSHA did not prove supplies were unavailable because an employee said bandages were generally kept in the trucks…
Westburne Drilling, Inc.
Two items vacated and one left de minimis
Three items from a nonserious citation against Westburne Drilling were before the Administrative Law Judge. The judge vacated items 1 and 2 and classified item 8 as de minimis with no penalty. The employer sought vacation of all three items, while the Secretary did not object to the judge's…
B. F. Goodrich Textile Products, a Division of The B. F. Goodrich Co.
Employer knowledge supplied adequate notice of machine violations
B. F. Goodrich manufactured tire cord and related products at a large Georgia textile plant. OSHA cited unguarded card-machine pulleys, unguarded loom sprockets and chains, fire extinguishers mounted too high, and missing signed crane-inspection reports without identifying every machine or…
I.T.O. Corporation of New England; John T. Clark & Son of Boston, Inc.; Terminal Services, Inc.
Withdrawn contests reinstate citations
An Administrative Law Judge had vacated citations against three employers in five consolidated dockets. After that decision, the employers asked to withdraw their notices of contest and terminate the proceedings. The Commission granted the request because it served the purposes of the OSH Act. It…
GAF Corporation
Two items affirmed under precedent, one dismissed
An Administrative Law Judge affirmed three citation items against GAF Corporation under subsections of the cited standard. On review, both parties agreed that an earlier divided Commission decision involving GAF controlled the first two items. A Commission majority therefore affirmed items 4a and…
Schiavone Construction Co.
Fall protection and cylinder items affirmed, air hose item vacated
Schiavone Construction was building an interstate highway when an employee worked on pile-driver leads without fall protection, about 14 feet above a steel platform and 20 feet above protruding steel piles. The Commission upheld the serious personal protective equipment citation because the…
Texaco, Inc.
Commission vacates a judge's order and remands to consider an amendment request
This is a brief procedural order in a case involving Texaco, Inc. The Commission directed the case for review on its own authority under 29 U.S.C. § 661(i). It vacated an order that Administrative Law Judge McQuade had issued on April 7, 1977, and sent the case back to the judge so that he could…
Geuder, Paeschke & Frey Company
Settlement approved after union received a hearing
OSHA cited metal-products fabricator Geuder, Paeschke & Frey for one serious general duty clause violation and 44 nonserious violations. The Secretary and employer proposed a settlement that deleted several nonserious items, extended two abatement periods, reduced three proposed penalties, and…
Marion Stephens, d/b/a Chapman & Stephens Company
General duty violation affirmed for work near a power line
Chapman & Stephens grew citrus and used 20-foot steel sprinkler pipes in a grove crossed by a low 7,200-volt power line. While three workers removed a bent pipe near the line, the pipe contacted it, killing one employee, rendering another unconscious, and knocking the supervisor to the ground. The…
Syracuse Rigging Co., Inc.
Hoist citation vacated because a new charge was not tried by consent
Syracuse Rigging used power drills to operate manual chain hoists while lowering a 68,800-pound tank, which fell and fatally injured an employee. OSHA cited the general duty clause and later added an alternative charge that the hoists did not let operators stand clear of the load. The judge…
Armco Steel Corporation
Housekeeping violations affirmed for wet and oily work areas
OSHA cited seven areas at Armco Steel's workplace for accumulations of oil, water, or grease, and the judge affirmed five of those subitems. Employees had reason to walk in or near the accumulations. Armco argued that the conditions were inherent or temporary, that they were corrected within a…
Seaward Construction Co., Inc.
Excavation item vacated because moving-ground danger was not proved
Seaward Construction had two employees working in a sewer excavation that contained compacted backfill, some tidal water, limited shoring, concrete-topped banks, and nearby road traffic. OSHA argued that the lack of specified slopes or shoring, together with the site conditions, established a…
Pittsburgh-Des Moines Steel Co.
Crane guarding item vacated for pre-1971 equipment
Pittsburgh-Des Moines Steel operated two overhead cranes built in 1910 and 1935 with unguarded rotating couplings and gears. Maintenance employees sometimes worked near those moving parts, and the judge found that guards were feasible and inexpensive. The Commission classified the cited guarding…
Stepan Chemical Company
Inadequate training for pressure-vessel work violated the general duty clause
Stepan Chemical assigned newly hired employees to release internal pressure from a vessel containing phthalic anhydride. OSHA alleged that the employees were not adequately trained and supervised in the pressure-vessel and hazardous-material risks of petrochemical work. The Commission explained…
Roanoke Iron & Bridge Works, Inc.
Column-sliding violation affirmed, other fall-protection charges rejected
Roanoke Iron & Bridge Works was erecting a five-story office building when employees regularly slid down vertical steel columns instead of using an available ladder for the final 50 feet to the ground. The Commission rejected the judge's greater-hazard defense because the record did not show that…
Butler Lime and Cement Company
Case remanded again for findings on crane safety training
A Butler Lime and Cement driver parked a crane-equipped delivery truck beneath a 4,800-volt power line, and he was later found deceased beside the truck after the boom contacted or closely approached the wires. OSHA cited the rule requiring at least 10 feet of clearance from power lines. After a…
Zidell Explorations, Inc.
Shipbreaking passageway citation vacated for insufficient proof
Zidell Explorations was dismantling the USS Bunker Hill when two employees worked on a deck area about six to seven feet wide with a fire hose and water hose running along it. OSHA argued that the hoses created a tripping hazard and showed that adequate aisles and passageways were not maintained…
Consumers Power Company
Electrical citation vacated because tree trimming was maintenance work
Consumers Power assigned tree trimmers in an insulated bucket truck to prune branches near a deenergized 41.6-kilovolt line. OSHA alleged that the company failed to tag, test, and ground the line and allowed an employee to work within the clearance required when a line must be treated as energized…
Vappi & Company, Inc.
Repeated classifications stand after an evenly divided Commission
Vappi & Company was a building contractor cited for three violations classified as repeated. Before the inspection, Vappi had received one final citation under each of the same standards at other worksites, based on substantially similar facts. The three Commissioners disagreed about whether one…
L. C. Anderson & Sons, Inc.
Serious fall-protection violation affirmed under the proper standard
Two L. C. Anderson employees tightened bolts while sitting on a horizontal I-beam about 20 feet above the ground without safety belts, lifelines, or similar protection. The Commission upheld the personal protective equipment violation because fall protection was feasible, the employer knew belts…
Aluminum Coil Anodizing Corp.
Multi-item citation upheld in part after inspection challenge failed
OSHA inspected Aluminum Coil Anodizing's Illinois plant after receiving a complaint from someone who was not an employee or employee representative. The Commission held that the complaint's source and purpose did not invalidate the inspection because OSHA also had broad general authority to inspect…
S. Puma Co., Inc.
Flat-roof perimeter guarding citation vacated
The judge affirmed a citation alleging that S. Puma failed to install perimeter guarding on a flat roof. The Commission applied its prior holding in Central City Roofing that the cited open-sided floor standard did not apply to flat roofs. It therefore vacated the citation and associated penalty.
Zwicker Electric Co., Inc.
Guardrail case remanded for employee-access and multiemployer defenses
Two Zwicker Electric employees spent two to three minutes on the fifth floor of a building under construction to determine whether it was ready and safe for later electrical work. Part of the floor perimeter was unguarded, but testimony conflicted over whether the employees were 3 feet or 25 feet…
King Arthur Inc.
Commission lets stand the vacatur of an unauthorized failure-to-abate notice
This case is about the order of operations OSHA must follow before it can penalize an employer for failing to fix a hazard. King Arthur Inc. had contested an earlier citation involving a power press (in a related docket, 76-1895) by writing to the area director within the 15-day window. Instead of…
Riverview Steel Erectors, Inc.
Steel-erection perimeter citation affirmed under a substituted standard
A Riverview Steel Erectors employee swept snow about one foot from the unguarded edge of a temporary metal-decked third floor, 22 feet above the ground. The judge found that the general open-sided floor rule did not apply because the work was still part of steel erection. He amended the charge to…
W. G. Cornell Co. of Washington, Inc.
Scaffold guardrail and access violations affirmed under substituted standards
W. G. Cornell employees used a roughly 40-foot tubular scaffold erected by the general contractor. Three upper platforms lacked guardrails, and employees climbed the scaffold's cross-braces because no adequate access ladder was provided. The judge held that the concrete-construction standard…
Alliance Enclosures, Inc.
Machine-guarding decision affirmed without substantive Commission review
OSHA cited Alliance Enclosures for missing guards on a radial arm saw, a power brake, a power shear, and four power presses. The judge found that the saw had an adjustable travel stop and vacated that part of the first citation, but affirmed the missing blade guard and the point-of-operation…
Busy Beaver Building Centers, Inc.
Floor-load citations vacated for freestanding storage platforms
OSHA cited Busy Beaver for a repeated failure to post approved floor-load limits on a storage platform and later proposed an additional $1,000 penalty for failing to correct a similar condition on another platform. The judge found that both platforms were freestanding storage structures inside…
Martin E. Keller Roofing Co., Inc.
Flat-roof fall-protection citation vacated
Three Martin E. Keller Roofing employees worked near the edge of a flat roof about 17 feet above the ground, beside a parapet measured at 14 to 18 inches. The judge found that perimeter guardrails would obstruct the roofing and flashing work at the edge. He also accepted unrebutted testimony that…
Max J. Kuney, Inc.
Backhoe hazard citation affirmed with reduced penalty
A Max J. Kuney laborer and backhoe operator were using both a shovel and the backhoe bucket to locate a water line in a shallow trench. The judge found that the moving bucket came within 1 to 2 feet of the laborer, exposing him for about 15 minutes to a recognized struck-by hazard that could cause…
Derr Construction Company
Safety-belt citation affirmed, five other steel-erection items vacated
Derr Construction was erecting a high-rise steel frame when an ironworker worked on the top edge of a girder on the 13th floor without using an available safety belt. The Commission upheld the serious personal protective equipment violation because the worker faced an obvious fall hazard and the…
Aero Engineering Co.
Respirator procedure citation affirmed with a $60 penalty
OSHA cited Aero Engineering for failing to prepare written procedures for the safe use of gas-mask and cartridge respirators during hydrochloric acid emergencies and normal operations. The company initially appeared to settle, later indicated that it wished to contest the case, and then did not…
George Hyman Construction Company
Six repeated classifications stand after a divided Commission
George Hyman admitted six construction violations involving material storage, electrical grounding, temporary-light guards, ladder clearance, floor-edge guarding, and crane operation. Each standard had been cited previously at another nearby Hyman worksite, and those earlier citations had become…
William Phillips Company
Commission declines to disturb an ALJ fall-protection ruling
William Phillips Company is a small seasonal contractor doing tuckpointing, caulking, and building waterproofing. During a December 1975 inspection at a Cleveland shopping center, an OSHA compliance officer found one of the company's employees kneeling on a parapet about 30 feet above a concrete…
Command Trucking & Warehouse Corp.
Failure-to-abate penalties reduced from $1,960 to $300
A reinspection found that Command Trucking had not timely corrected four previously final conditions involving a locked exit, a floor hole, an ungrounded portable battery charger, and an inadequately guarded compressor drive. The judge rejected the company's claim that Customs Service rules…
Beth Israel Medical Center Hospital
Garbage odor and vermin citations vacated for lack of proof
OSHA cited Beth Israel Medical Center after a complaint that odors, insects, rodents, and vermin from a temporary garbage shed affected employees in nearby offices. During the inspection, the compliance officer detected only a slight deodorizer-like odor near a window and did not consider it…
Siegel-Scola-Trento Dyers, Inc.
Interlocked guards required for revolving feather-drying drums
Siegel-Scola-Trento used four slowly rotating mesh drums to dry feathers. The drums lacked enclosures interlocked with the drive mechanism, and an employee stopped them by using a stick to force an overhead belt off its pulley while the equipment was moving. The company speculated that compliant…
The Lane Construction Corporation
Safety-belt violation affirmed, net and guardrail items vacated
Two Lane Construction employees stood and leaned over a bridge parapet more than 25 feet above a lower deck while attaching scaffold members to a mobile stripping wagon without personal fall protection. The judge affirmed the personal protective equipment violation because safety belts were…
Munro Waterproofings, Inc.
Serious floor-opening violation affirmed at a high-rise worksite
Munro Waterproofings employees worked on the 40th floor of a high-rise where a 12-to-15-inch-wide opening surrounded a climbing tower. The judge found that employees could use a stairway that required them to step across the unguarded opening. Although the general contractor was contractually…
James Mellon, d/b/a Huntington Metal Window Service
Floor-opening and hard-hat violations affirmed
Huntington Metal Window Service employees installing windows used a second-floor stairway beside a large opening with incomplete guarding and a 12-foot drop. The judge found that the subcontractor could have covered enough of the opening to protect its workers without creating the union conflict it…
The Bucket Elevator Company
Flammable-liquid and welding penalties reduced to $200 total
The Bucket Elevator Company accepted serious citations involving flammable-liquid transfer near ignition sources and inadequate screening of a welding area, but contested the two proposed $600 penalties. The fire hazard involved vapors that could ignite near welding, while unshielded arc rays could…
H. W. Ivey Construction Co., Inc.
Scaffold and tower violations affirmed, other fall items vacated
H. W. Ivey was constructing a four-level parking garage with scaffolds at three corners and an approximately 40-foot elevator and stair tower. The judge affirmed serious violations for missing or improperly installed scaffold cross-bracing, missing scaffold guardrails and toeboards, and an…
United States Steel Corporation
Crane resistor citation narrowed to normal production and light-changing operations
U.S. Steel operated overhead cranes with uncovered resistor banks on bridge walkways used by maintenance employees. The Commission held that troubleshooting a crane while it was out of production and controlled by the maintenance worker was not a normal operating condition, so the cited rule did…
Fisk-Oesco Joint Venture
Three electrical and ladder items vacated, one plug-cover item affirmed without penalty
Fisk-Oesco Joint Venture was an electrical contractor installing circuits during construction of a hospital. OSHA cited a cracked welder receptacle with an exposed prong, a welder cable resting on a catwalk, a pipe-bender plug missing its wire-termination cover, and ladder rails that did not extend…
Bernard S. Costello, Inc.
Longshoring citations affirmed after the employer withdrew its contest
Bernard S. Costello, Inc. operated as a contract stevedore and terminal operator. OSHA cited the company after employees worked near unguarded open weather-deck hatches and handled cargo without protective hats. The judge found that the open hatches exposed two employees to a possible 17-foot fall…
Cedar Construction Company
Two willful trench violations merged into one with a $4,750 penalty
Cedar Construction Company excavated trenches and installed utility sewer pipe for the City of Lincoln, Nebraska. Two employees were working in a 14-to-15-foot-deep trench when part of a wall collapsed, fatally injuring one employee. The Commission found that the trench had water and unstable soil…
Suburban Concrete Corporation
Floor-hole and open-side items affirmed, concrete-work charge vacated
Suburban Concrete Corporation had an employee correcting work on the second floor of a construction site after the area had been turned over to the general contractor. OSHA cited an uncovered floor hole and loose cables along open sides of the floor, both within several feet of the employee's work…
Craig D. Lawrenz & Associates, Inc.
Three trenching violations and $330 penalty affirmed
Craig D. Lawrenz & Associates installed water and sewer systems and was inspected at two trenching locations along a Wisconsin highway. The judge found that excavated material was not set back or retained from a water-pipe trench, the sides of that trench were inadequately supported or sloped in…
Interstruct Corporation, a Division of International Basic Economy Corporation
Crane-record failure to abate affirmed, saw-guard charge dismissed
Interstruct Corporation manufactured prestressed and post-stressed concrete products in Puerto Rico. OSHA alleged that the company had not abated earlier violations involving a hand-fed ripsaw guard, truck-crane inspection records, and overhead-crane inspections. The judge dismissed the saw-guard…
Baroid Division of NL Industries, Inc.
Diesel-tank citation vacated for lack of proof and control
Baroid supplied drilling fluid and technical assistance at an oil-well site operated by another company. OSHA cited Baroid because a 10,000-gallon portable diesel tank near the drilling platform was not surrounded by grading, curbing, or diking. The judge found that OSHA had not reliably proved the…
Zwicker Electric Company
Building-opening and stairway charges vacated for lack of employee access
Zwicker Electric Company was an electrical subcontractor working in two 20-story buildings at a Brooklyn construction project. OSHA cited unguarded lobby door and window openings beside deep exterior ditches and two stairways without railings. The Commission found that OSHA's inspector gave…
MacMillan Industries, Inc.
Thermatron machine-guarding citation affirmed with a reduced penalty
MacMillan Industries fabricated canvas and plastic products and used a two-operator Thermatron machine to seal plastic with heat and pressure. OSHA measured a three-quarter-inch opening between the machine's descending bar and bottom plate, twice the three-eighth-inch opening indicated on the…
Therrel-Kizer, Inc.
Flat-roof perimeter-guarding citation vacated
Therrel-Kizer was cited for failing to install perimeter guarding on a flat roof. The administrative law judge affirmed the citation under the open-sided-floor standard. The Commission applied its intervening decision holding that the cited standard did not apply to flat roofs. It therefore vacated…
What these documents are
- Commission decisions: Rulings by the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission itself, the highest level of agency review. These are citable as Commission precedent, though a decision may have been appealed to a U.S. Court of Appeals after issuance.
- ALJ decisions: Rulings by OSHRC Administrative Law Judges after a hearing. When no Commissioner directs review, an ALJ decision becomes a final order under 29 U.S.C. § 661(j): it binds the parties in that case but is not binding precedent in other cases.
- Why finality matters: Every page here says which kind of decision you are reading, so you know whether it is precedent you can cite or a final order that only shows how one judge ruled on one set of facts.
- Where they come from: Every page links the official OSHRC public release, and the full text on the page is that release. The plain-English summaries are written by Ezel.