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June 29, 2025
OSHA has renewed its National Emphasis Program on Amputations in Manufacturing Industries, focused on preventing amputations in manufacturing workplaces.
Under the renewed program, which aims to identify and mitigate hazards that could lead to amputations and other injuries in the manufacturing sector, OSHA will conduct inspections of manufacturing facilities to ensure compliance with safety practices...
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June 28, 2025
This footage would be great to use in a management setting to discuss failures in our safety process. My plant managers (all four of them) would immediately make the snarky comment about not having a “bullseye” painted on the bucket. It was simply a matter of time!!!
I/m betting this “practice” was “routine” (Reason’s HF model) and done in the name of “reducing congestion”. Honestly,...
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June 27, 2025
A picture-perfect BLEVE caught on drone cam. A storm chaser captured this fire and BLEVE while traveling to chase a storm in Canada. This was in Sidney, MT, and may be the best training video showing a BLEVE (he has even slowed the footage down so we can see it in slow motion).
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Chemical Process Safety (PSM/RMP)
Hazardous Materials
Lockout Tagout
Permit Required Confined Spaces
June 26, 2025
I have debated this many times and finally just gave up on the industry to do the right thing. And yes, there is a line item in NFPA 350, that I have requested the NFPA to address. But for me, in all my years, we would evacuate the NH3 from the condenser coils and lock out the fan(s) in order to reclassify the condenser to a Non-PRCS. Case in point… condenser tubes FAIL and release NH3. And...
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June 26, 2025
A piping fitting failed, resulting in the release of approximately 5 pounds of ammonia (NH3) in the machinery room. The nipple (fitting) between the oil separator and its relief valve cracked and failed to hold ammonia in the piping, resulting in the activation of the exhaust ventilation system. Fittings made of certain materials are incompatible with ammonia and degrade quickly in its presence....
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June 26, 2025
In an ammonia refrigeration system, ammonia in a gas state is compressed from the compressor to high-pressure, high-temperature ammonia gas. The compressed gas heats as its pressurised. The hot gas enters an oil separator, where the ammonia gas and compressor oil is separated so that oil is not carried over with the ammonia gas to the coils and other components. The hot ammonia gas is directed to the...
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June 26, 2025
This is becoming more common these days; I never encountered it in my career at any of my facilities, as it’s not just a matter of sound engineering. The response I usually get during audits, PHAs, Engineering Code Design reviews is… “show me in the code that says I can’t use a hose on the discharge side of a PRD with a setpoint of X”. And my response is simple…...
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June 25, 2025
Last month, Federal OSHA issued a three (3) part GDC citation for a Polishing and Sanding Area’s combustible dust system. Specifically OSHA took issue with the Design and Operation of the Combustible Dust Collection system:
Grounding and Bonding
Duct wortk not proerly designed and installed
excessive accumulation of COM DUST in hoods
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June 25, 2025
I have written several articles on Fit test Records with QNFT results, exceeding 10,000. I have seen number as high as 500,000. And to be honest I’m not sure why the makers of the QNFT machines even have the ability to record numbers over 10,000, as most of these manufacturers will state anything over 10,000 is “suspect” and should not be accepted. SO, in this day and age, I thought...
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June 25, 2025
Not meant to be a trick question, but we see this failure often, especially when the facility utilizes “test vans” for their One-Stop safety testing that includes Audiograms for HCP requiremenrts and Fit Testing for the RP program. This applies ONLY to those doing Quantitative Fit Testing (QNFT).
If we are doing QNFT, such as the Porta-Count method, Appendix A states:
(emphasis by...
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June 24, 2025
Another international brand of cooling towers/evaporative condensers is marketing their product as if it is NOT a Confined Space or a Permit-Required Confined Space. For those who follow my safety rampages, know how this enrages me! As shown by the pictures below, this Cooling Tower is without question a Permit-Required Confined Space (PRCS); however, as shown below, one would never get this from...
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June 23, 2025
I see this all the time… E-stops on Hazardous Materials process located at the point of the expected/intended failure point, such as a loading/unloading station. Many safety pros have experience with E-stops as a safety device for machinery/equipment, in which the E-stop is located at the point of potential entrapment inside the machine/equipment. Even ANSI requires this location.
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