@mvanhank222 In construction anything above 6 feet (as a general rule) requires fall protection.?ÿ In "General Industry" (maintenance, etc.) anything above 4 feet requires fall protection.?ÿ I spent a few years as a safety observer and always preached "Fall Prevention" over "Fall Protection".?ÿ Slips, trips and falls are the leading causes of injury in construction every year.
I've been on two sites where a fatality took place.?ÿ One was totally preventable, an operator went up into a pipe where a gasoline powered pump was operating.?ÿ Carbon monoxide got him.?ÿ The second was just the wrong place at the wrong time.?ÿ The crew was headed back to work from a lunch break, he had a heart attack and died.
Dealing with OSHA can be a REAL pain.?ÿ ALWAYS keep documentation of training, etc.?ÿ As far as OSHA is concerned if it's not documented it didn't happen.
Andy
10k for an employee dying a preventative death on a job site is a poor value on human life, in NZ it's more like 500k fine!
@larry-best why should I spent the extra time??ÿ Their form setters have no problem working in these holes and they have the attitude that if everybody else does it, I should be willing to put my people at risk.
@dougie If they make it safe, I have no problem with it but they don't want to spend the money to do it properly.
@williwaw they either don't understand the danger or don't care.?ÿ I give them the elevation with fills to the first floor and they do the math to set their own top of wall elevation, they can use the same math to measure down to the finished grade line privided on the Plot Plan.
@leegreen this is residential work, on the commercial jobs the over dig is usually so big that it's not an issue.
@mightymoe they want us to show them where the waterproofing tar/paint stops.
@norman-oklahoma there is no reason for anybody other than the form setters and masons climbing forms or measuring them.?ÿ The issue lies in fast paced construction.?ÿ We probably layout about 30 single family homes a week for a number of contractors.?ÿ Some of them are good about making things safe, others just want to cut corners to save time so they can move on to their next pour.
@brad-ott The OSHA regs on this are as clear as they can be for everybody involved.?ÿ I will not budge on it.?ÿ There is no need to look at my business model, it has worked well for over two decades.
I have no problem letting somebody else do it either, like you said, I can sleep good at night knowing everybody made it home alive.
@holy-cow death happens in a variety of ways but some deaths are avoidable.
@tim-libs that's the problem, they want to do things quick & dirty, get paid and move to the next one.?ÿ They really don't care about safety or even understand their own liability.
@fairbanksls if they dig that hole properly, I'm in and out in 40 minutes or less and everybody is happy.?ÿ It would only take them an hour to properly make that hole safe while they are digging.
It doesn??t seem that standard trench safety rules are applied to standard 8?? house foundations but maybe 10?? walls would be an issue. Walking a 10?? wall would definitely be a no go even after backfill you would be within a zone requiring fall protection you could potentially use a ladder or do the asbuilt reflector less. That being said there a lot of exceptions to the rules regarding residential construction vs commercial/industrial/government construction.
In WA, 4' high requires fall protection.
I got in a hurry once about 30 years ago and fell a bit over ten feet. We didn't get fined by OSHA, but I've been in pain every day since. Dumbest decision I ever made.
Give them a tape and wish them luck.
10k for an employee dying a preventative death on a job site is a poor value on human life, in NZ it's more like 500k fine!
In a way $10,000 hurts more than $500,000. Most of us could actually pay a $10k fine. It would hurt, but we could raise it. $500,000 - for most of us - would not be paid, you would just go out of business and into bankruptcy.
@mvanhank222 trench safety and open excavation safety fall under two different OSHA classifications.?ÿ Pinning the footing in an open foundation hole is not so much of an issue because if something happens there is an open escape route into the center of the hole.?ÿ When the walls are dug vertically and the foundation walls are poured the work space around the exterior becomes a two or three foot wide trench that is typically in the area of 8' deep.?ÿ All the ladders in the world are not going to save you in those conditions if the tranch walls are not either benched or properly sloped.
@mvanhank222 there really aren't any exceptions in commercial vs residential work.?ÿ The standaeds might be different based on the type of excavation but the appropriate OSHA regs still apply.?ÿ Soing the asbuild is not the issue, them want the finished grades marked on the foundation walls which required walking into a deep, potentially unstable trench.?ÿ They can easily do their own measure downs from top of block to establish finished grade for their waterproofing without putting my people at risk.
Once the walls are back filled there is no reason to walk them.
@andy-bruner I've had the displeasure of seeing two people killed on job sites within feet from me, neither of them being fellow employees.?ÿ One I could not do anything about and the other I tried.?ÿ The vision of both of them still haunts me after many years have passed.?ÿ I don't want to be a part of my guys meeting that fate.
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