About 10 years back, I refused to enter a roller hearth furnace

[hedgehog]

because there was not a positive block* on the DX gas line. I also reported to the Safety Department that entry into this furnace without blocking the line was a violation of OSHA rules regarding confined space entry. For my efforts, I had the head of Engineering/Maintenance screaming in my face for a good 20 minutes. The next few years of my life were hell. I'd be assigned to supervise department maintenance on days because things were falling apart, I'd get things put together and then I'd be sent back to nights because I insisted on quaint practices like lock-out/tag out. They did everything they could to make me quit including assigning me the hardest, dirtiest job they could find when the union was out on strike. I was the only management person in Engineering/Maintenance that pulled strike duty in a production department. I couldn't afford to quit, but they finally fired my ass under the guise of a temporary lay-off.

Today I opened the paper and found this:

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2009/07/osha_proposes_249000_in_fines.html


Today I'm smiling. I'm glad I worked for Obama!




* I would have been happy with breaking the line, inserting a blind flange or doule block and bleed.

[sfwriter]

1. Yay! Vindication...

Though that amount of money is a slap on the wrist.

[hedgehog]

2. It just about matches what I would have been paid inthe intervening years

if they hadn't fired my ass!

[msedano]

3. a worker died...

...that's a hard price to pay for vindication. your peers made life miserable for you, you endured it. otoh, the honchos had confidence you'd make a difference in those hardest dirtiest tasks, and if you didn't accomplish you'd fire yourself. i'm sure you did not work miracles, the hard dirty place was still the same when you were reassigned, you wrought only minor miracles. yet, your work product quality saved your ass, until the bigshots figured the hard dirty jobs weren't worth doing anymore. bye bye the guy who does those.

[hedgehog]

5. I was given assignments designed to make me quit. Too bad

I couldn't afford to quit without another job waiting! I was fired because I made other people look bad.

It's pretty bad a man had to die. The place he worked had a series of roll stands cooled with water sprays. Imagine what happens to a water spray when the temperature in the building is -5 degrees. All they had to do was stop the rolls long enough for him to climb up and down some icy stairs to replace a broken hose. They didn't do it and a man died.

They killed another man while I was still working there. No cause was ever given, but my best guess from what I know is they deliberately and ignorantly over-rode some safety features to cause an explosion.

[Tansy_Gold]

4. Reading the comments posted to that article is depressing

Blame the worker, blame the worker, OSHA kills business, too much regulation, blame the worker, blame the worker, safety regs force jobs off shore, ugh.

Our populace is indeed totally dumbed down.