In 2011, The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 7.5% of all recordable injuries and illnesses and 14.4 % of all fatal injuries in the private industries involved slips, trips and falls. These statistics are second only to motor vehicles as a cause of fatalities. The National Safety Council’s Injury Facts 2009 edition estimated the average cost of lost time injury was about $43,000 per incident. Slips trips and falls cost the U.S. economy 10’s of billions of dollars annually.
The general duty clause of the Occupational Health and Safety Act mandates that “Each employer shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards…” OSHA established 1910.21-27 standards to address the safety concerns of walking and working surfaces in the workplace. In compliance with these standards, employers are expected to keep all places of employment, floors, passageways, stairways, and storerooms clean, orderly, in sanitary condition and free from any health and safety hazard.
Floors should be kept clean and dry as far as possible. Employers are required to maintain drainage, platforms, mats or other dray standing places where wet processes are used. Every workplace floor and passageway should be free from protruding nails, splinters, holes, or loose boards to facilitate cleaning.
Aisles and passageways should have sufficient safe clearances for mechanical equipment and should be marked appropriately. Covers and guardrails should be provided where necessary to protect from the hazards of open pits, tanks, ditches, etc. Loads should never exceed the approved structural load of the building floor. Maximum load should be marked and affixed in the appropriate areas.
Every stairway with four or more risers, floor openings measuring 12 inches or more in their least dimension, ladder-ways, skylight or manhole floor openings, all should be guarded by standard railing. Winding stairs should be equipped with handrail offset to prevent walking on all portions of the treads having width less than 6 inches.
All ladders are required to be free from damage and rungs free from grease and oil. The foot of the ladder should be positioned no more than one-quarter of their working length from the top to prevent slippage. Ladders should not be placed on boxes, barrels, or in places where it could block doorways. Ladders should be used only for their intended purpose not as platforms, runways, or scaffolds.
There is no silver bullet solution to slips trips and falls. It takes a proactive management to clean the clutter, create a safety culture, and train and make employees aware and part of the safety program.
Employees should avoid wearing loose shirts and dragging pants. Employees are expected to wear appropriate footwear and be trained to report any unsafe condition such as: uneven surface, worn tiles, loose mats or rugs, hose or chords in the walkways, cracks, holes, missing hole covers, missing guardrail, spilled coffee, oil leak, etc. Employees should be part of the hazard control process.
Many tripping hazards are housekeeping items. Hoses and chords across walkways are continual hazard. Rerouting or using protectors reduce these hazards dramatically. Cleaning spills and leaks right after they occur or reporting unsafe conditions as soon as they are observed should become the practice and concern of every employee.
A workplace safety program should include pre-shift inspections of all work areas to ensure no slip trip and fall hazards exist. Waste containers and spill cleanup materials should be easily accessible. Work areas should be well lit and any burnt lights should be replaced without any delay.
Comply with OSHA for a safer workplace.
