For the second time in recent weeks, a company says it will contest OSHA fines in connection with the death of an employee due to heat stress.
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Tags: contest OSHA fine, General Duty Clause, heat related death, heat stress
How do you test whether PPE creates employee susceptibility to heat stress? Get a Sweating Thermal Manikin (STM).
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Tags: heat stress, NIOSH, PPE, sweating thermal manikin
OSHA doesn’t have any regulations specific to making sure workers are protected from heat. But that doesn’t stop the agency from fining companies for failing to protect workers against hot conditions.
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Tags: General Duty Clause, heat related death, heat stress, outdoor workers
California already has the strictest regulations on the books to provide relief for outdoor workers in hot conditions. A bill passed by the state’s legislature would have created new penalties for breaking these rules, but the effort has been stopped by a veto.
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Tags: farmworker, Gov. Jerry Brown veto, heat stress, outdoor workers
OSHA has denied a request by several groups to enact an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) setting a heat threshold level for workers. But OSHA is addressing the issue, including enforcement through the General Duty Clause (GDC).
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Tags: Emergency Temporary Standard, General Duty Clause, heat stress, Public Citizen
A newspaper has investigated reports about working conditions at an Amazon.com warehouse that serves one-third of the country. Employee claims point to extreme indoor heat, closed doors when it was hot, work rates that couldn’t be sustained and firing threats when workers couldn’t keep up in the heat.
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Tags: Amazon, closed doors, extreme heat, firing threats, heat index, heat stress, Integrity Staffing Solutions, OSHA inspection, paramedics, The Morning Call
California has been cracking down on farms that don’t provide outdoor workers with enough water and shade on hot days. Indoor workers can suffer from heat stress, too, but you wouldn’t expect libraries to be on the list of places with problems due to hot conditions.
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A lot of attention has been paid lately to the plight of farm workers who labor in extreme heat in California. But heat stress dangers aren’t limited to the agriculture industry.
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California is one of only two states to have regulations that require employers to take steps to reduce employee injuries or deaths due to heat stress. It’s also been issuing fines and even shutting down some companies that have violated the regs. But now a lawsuit says California isn’t doing enough.
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Tags: ACLU lawsuit, agricultural workers, CAL-OSHA, heat stress, United Farm Workers Union
California is serious about providing outdoor workers with relief from heat: Three top officials for a now out-of-business farm labor contractor face involuntary manslaughter charges in the death of a teen from heat stress.
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Tags: heat stress, involuntary manslaughter, Maria Vasquez Jimenez, relief from heat
