A little light reading from OSHA and NIOSH

Contributed by Eric Tofte, Director of Training, Evergreen Safety Council
Did you know that According to OSHA that more than 145,000 people work in over 7,000 warehouses and the fatal injury rate for the warehousing industry is higher than the national average for all industries. OSHA has also developed a pocket guide for warehouse safety.

According to NIOSH workers are at risk of severe injury and death during machine maintenance and servicing if proper lockout and tagout procedures are not followed. NIOSH recommends developing and implementing a hazardous energy control program including lockout and tagout procedures and worker training to prevent such incidents. NIOSH has a LOTO publication for you to review.

We made it out alive

Today at 8:15 am the building began to shake....fire alarms sounded...and various other emergencies were imagined. Staff members grabbed their coats (and coffees), and headed for our rally point at the back of our parking lot.

Evergreen Safety Council was participating in the Cascade Neighborhood Preparedness Project: Evacuation Drill. The purpose of the evacuation drill was to:

• Exercise our organizations’ building evacuation plans (as normally conducted on an annual basis)


• Gain greater awareness and understanding of evacuation plans across the neighborhood


• Improve emergency preparedness for our staff, individual organizations and the neighborhood

Has your organization held an evacuation drill in the past year? Being prepared is key to ensuring employee and visitor safety. If you can schedule an evacuation drill for your whole organization (as appropriate) great! If not, there is still great value in you or key leaders and facility staff walking through your plans –the more people from your organization that participate, the better - even if it is just a small representative group.

If you don't know where to start, ESC trainers can help. Contact Eric Tofte for more information.

All the pictures from this morning are posted on the Evergreen Safety Council Facebook page.

Stay safe!

Tesoro Accident Safety Video

Contributed by Eric Tofte, Director of Training, Evergreen Safety Council

Marking the one year anniversary of the tragic accident at the Tesoro Refinery in Anacortes, Washington, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) released a video safety message in which Chairperson Rafael Moure-Eraso urges refinery companies to “make the investments necessary to ensure safe operations,” concluding, “Companies that continue to invest in safety and recognize its importance will reap benefits far into the future.”

CFLs and Preventing Murcury Exposure

Contributed by Eric Tofte, Director of Training, Evergreen Safety Council

The US is phasing out regular light bulbs and the US EPA encourages Americans to use compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) for residential lighting to save energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions that lead to global climate change.

Fluorescent light bulbs contain mercury. You can prevent potential mercury exposure to you and your environment by:

• storing and handling CFLs responsibly;


• following our tips when cleaning up broken CFLs; and


• recycling or disposing of CFLs properly.

For all of you that would like to see the detailed clean up recommendations if you break a CFL in your home, please follow this link.

Safety & Health Solutions - May edition

Evergreen Safety Council produces a monthly newsletter covering a variety of safety topics. Each month we will provide a link here to the online PDF.

Inside this Issue:

Lead Article – Emergency Preparedness

People in Safety – Jeff Long, OSHA 500 and HAZWOPER Instructor

Regular Articles:

• When is Compression-Only (Hands-Only) CPR Appropriate?


• Five Things I’d Like to See


• Zirkle Fruit Awarded the Safety Excellence Award


• Positioning Your Vehicle Safety in the Great Outdoors


• Regular Features: Membership Corner, Forklift Corner, Calendar of Events, Safety Gallery, and more....

You can also sign up to receive an electronic copy via email or hard copy via the mail. This link will also take you to a full archive with over four years of past issues.

So pour yourself a cup of coffee, sit back and read all about what's going on in the world of safety & health.