Resources for Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)

Fatal blast in Georgia blows up OSHA dust rules

www.stltoday.com

Sometimes a safety issue literally blows up in the face of federal regulators. That was the case last month when an explosion and fire at an Imperial Sugar Co. refinery in Port Wentworth, Ga., likely caused by the ignition of sugar dust, killed 13 workers and left 10 others with serious burns.

The accident on Feb. 7 was the latest of some 300 since 1980 that have killed more than 100 workers and injured 800. The Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration ignored a recommendation to create a single dust-control rule, saying it already has 17 regulations warning employers about deadly dust buildups.

An oversight hearing on the subject on March 12 shows how the Democratic-controlled Congress has grown weary of President George W. Bush's approach to regulatory policy, which stresses partnerships with industry and voluntary efforts to keep workplaces safe.

"I see such an incredible lack of urgency on the part of your agency to protect workers," Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., who heads the House Education and Labor Committee, told OSHA director Edwin Foulke Jr.

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