Federal agency decisions, searchable in plain English.
Workplace-safety cases from the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) and mine-safety cases from the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission (FMSHRC), each with a plain-English summary, the standards it cites, and whether it counts as precedent. More agencies are coming.
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Guarco Construction Company
Repeat trench cave-in citation affirmed $7,000
Guarco Construction, a two-person company acting as general contractor, was installing a sewer line at a restaurant in East Granby, Connecticut. Two off-duty OSHA officers driving past noticed an unshored, unsloped trench and stopped to inspect. They measured the trench at about 5 feet 4 inches to…
Broshear Contractors, Inc.
Trench egress and cave-in protection violations affirmed
Broshear Contractors excavated a trench along a public road in Ohio to install a water line. The Commission rejected the company's Fourth Amendment challenge because the compliance officer observed the open trench and employees from a public road, where the company had no reasonable expectation of…
E.L. Davis Contracting Co.
Excavation violations affirmed with $70,500 in penalties
E.L. Davis Contracting was repairing a sewer line when part of a 20- to 22-foot excavation containing two employees caved in. The Commission affirmed serious violations involving the company's safety program, excavation and confined-space training, and the absence of inspections by a competent…
Roberts Pipeline Construction, Inc.
$30,800 in penalties affirmed for eight violations
Roberts Pipeline challenged only the penalties assessed for eight serious violations involving training, head protection, compressed-gas storage, electrical grounding, trench access and inspection, and cave-in protection. The Commission held that the judge had considered the statutory factors of…
Gardner Fire Protection
Trench egress and cave-in items affirmed, daily-inspection item vacated
Gardner Fire Protection, a small pro se contractor, was installing sewer and fire-hydrant lines at a KOA campground in Seminole, Florida. A December 1992 OSHA inspection came the day after a broken water line flooded the excavation overnight and eroded one wall. OSHA cited four serious…
Gustafson Construction Corporation
Trench cave-in violation affirmed as serious, $1,200
Gustafson Construction Corporation was installing water main and sewer lines in a subdivision in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. OSHA inspected in May 1993 and cited the company for several items. Gustafson withdrew its challenge to all but one: a serious trench cave-in item requiring an adequate protective…
Conie Construction, Inc.
Willful excavation violation affirmed with $21,000 penalty
Three Conie Construction employees worked in an excavation about 20 to 21 feet deep, with hard clay above solid rock. The Commission found that the excavation was too narrow at the top to provide the slope required for Type A soil. Conie's foreman knew the excavation standard but relied on his own…
Fort Defiance Construction & Supply, Inc.
All three trenching items vacated
Fort Defiance Construction & Supply was installing utilities in a trench at a Dayton, Ohio, road project. OSHA alleged that employees lacked a safe exit, that the onsite foreman was not a competent person, and that the trench lacked adequate cave-in protection. The judge found that employees could…
Blankenship & Lee Pipeline Co., Inc.
Trenching and hazard-communication violations affirmed
Blankenship & Lee Pipeline was reconstructing sewer lines for a pumping station in Pelham, Georgia. An employee worked in a vertical trench that measured between 5 feet 4 inches and 6 feet deep without a ladder, adequate cave-in protection, or a hard hat; loose spoil was stored only inches from the…
Metric Constructors, Inc.
General contractor held liable for subcontractor hazards
Metric Constructors was the general contractor for a 29-building federal prison project covering about 200 acres in Estill, South Carolina. OSHA cited scaffold, trench, hazard-communication, fire-extinguisher, compressed-gas-cylinder, and trench-access conditions created by subcontractors whose…
Triangle Engineering Corp.
Mixed construction ruling carries $1,350 in penalties
Triangle Engineering was the general contractor building a prison in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. The ALJ affirmed serious violations involving site-specific safety instruction, missing edge guardrails, an accessible crane swing radius, and an unprotected excavation. She also affirmed other-than-serious…
S.K. Construction Company
Trench citation vacated for employee misconduct
S.K. Construction was repairing a sanitary sewer in Middletown, Ohio. A newly promoted foreman briefly entered a 13-foot-deep excavation without the required protective system while a worker was retrieving equipment to widen a trench box. OSHA alleged a willful trench-protection violation and…
Manter Co., Inc.
Trench violations affirmed and willful classification reduced
Manter Company excavated a nine-foot-deep trench to install a valve on an existing water main at a restaurant property in Woburn, Massachusetts. Employees had no ladder or stairway and climbed a wet, steep Type C soil bank that was partly blocked by a backhoe, so the ALJ affirmed the safe-egress…
Madison Underground, Inc.
Commission declines declaratory review of trench item
Madison Underground performed sewer and water-main work in two unprotected excavations in New Berlin, Wisconsin. The ALJ affirmed one willful trench-protection item because an employee entered the north excavation, the company had no communicated rule against entry into unprotected trenches, and it…
A. R. Butler Construction Co.
Commission approves trench-case settlement
A. R. Butler Construction was installing a sewer line in an eight-and-a-half to nine-foot trench in Flint City, Alabama. The underlying ALJ decision found that the steep earthen route was not a safe means of exit and that employees worked without adequate cave-in protection. The judge classified…
Supermason Enterprises
Willful unprotected-trench violation affirmed
Supermason Enterprises installed a sanitary sewer in Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania, with two workers in an excavation eight to ten feet deep. The ALJ rejected the company's claim that the workers belonged to a subcontractor because the supposed agreement was unsigned, the alleged subcontractor had never…
Ray Sumlin Construction Co., Inc.
Unprotected excavation results in $4,000 penalty
OSHA observed a Ray Sumlin Construction employee working in a six-foot-deep excavation with vertical walls and no cave-in protection at a county jail project in Alabama. The superintendent initially requested a warrant but later invited the compliance officer to examine the excavation and helped…
Fluidics, Inc.
Mixed construction ruling assesses $13,600
Fluidics performed mechanical-system renovations at a Philadelphia public-housing project with unusually difficult site-security conditions. The judge affirmed serious violations involving unsecured and improperly separated compressed-gas cylinders, missing GFCI protection, exposed energized…
PDC, Inc.
Trench-exit item affirmed, cave-in item vacated
PDC employees installed a gas line in a trench beside a Georgia highway that ranged from four and a half to eight and a half feet deep. The trench had no ladder or other safe means of egress, and workers exited by placing their hands on the ground and jumping from the shallow end. The judge…
Oklahoma Natural Gas
Excavation items reduced to nonserious violations
Oklahoma Natural Gas employees worked in a trench while installing a gas line in Oklahoma City. The judge found that one wall did not meet the protective-system requirements for the Type C soil and that the foreman was not a competent person under the revised excavation rules because he had not yet…
Philadelphia Construction Equipment, Inc.
Default affirms excavation citations for $16,650
Philadelphia Construction Equipment failed to appear for its scheduled hearing on serious and willful construction citations. After an initial remand gave the company another opportunity, the ALJ rejected its explanation for arriving late and found no good cause to reinstate the case. The record…
Piping of Ohio, Inc.
Trenching violations affirmed, willful item reclassified as repeated
Piping of Ohio was replacing a water line in two excavations at an Ohio steel plant. The judge found that employees lacked adequate trench-safety instruction, did not have a safe means of exit, and were not protected by inspections from a qualified competent person. The judge also found that the…
Western Plains Construction
Unprotected trench violation affirmed
Western Plains Construction was installing storm sewer pipe in a trench in Tulsa, Oklahoma. OSHA found the south end of the trench about 9 feet 6 inches deep with vertical, unprotected walls. The company argued that the condition resulted from unpreventable misconduct by its superintendent, but the…
Vogel Brothers
Four serious construction violations affirmed, two vacated
Vogel Brothers Building Company was the general contractor on a wastewater administration building project in Tampa, Florida. The judge affirmed serious violations involving an unavailable fire extinguisher at a diesel fueling area, unguarded floor edges, an unbarricaded crane swing radius, and…
Earl A. Eichline Enterprises, Inc.
Trench cave-in protection violation affirmed, two other items vacated
Earl A. Eichline Enterprises was repairing a water line valve in an excavation in New Berlin, Wisconsin. OSHA cited the company for inadequate cave-in protection, no safe means of exit, and failure to provide high-visibility garments near traffic. The judge affirmed the repeated cave-in protection…
Abbott Contractors, Inc.
Two willful trench cave-in violations affirmed, penalty reduced to $40,000
Abbott Contractors, Inc. installs water mains and was working in Aurora, Illinois. In July and August 1991, OSHA inspected two of its trenching worksites. Before the hearing the parties settled all items except two willful excavation items, which alleged that employees worked in trenches about 9 to…
Flint Engineering & Construction Co.
Controlling contractor liable for trench hazards
Flint Engineering opened an approximately 11-foot-deep pipeline trench with vertical, unprotected walls and a large spoil bank at its edge. The administrative law judge found that the workers seen in the trench were not Flint employees, but that Flint created and controlled the hazardous…
Ford Development Corporation
Hazard communication and trench rulings modified
OSHA inspected Ford Development after a trench wall shifted and trapped an employee's foot during drainage-pipe work in Ohio. The Commission declined to dismiss the case because the Secretary transmitted Ford's notice of contest seven days late through an inadvertent clerical error, with no…
What these documents are
- Commission decisions: Rulings by the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission itself, the highest level of agency review. These are citable as Commission precedent, though a decision may have been appealed to a U.S. Court of Appeals after issuance.
- ALJ decisions: Rulings by OSHRC Administrative Law Judges after a hearing. When no Commissioner directs review, an ALJ decision becomes a final order under 29 U.S.C. § 661(j): it binds the parties in that case but is not binding precedent in other cases.
- Why finality matters: Every page here says which kind of decision you are reading, so you know whether it is precedent you can cite or a final order that only shows how one judge ruled on one set of facts.
- Where they come from: Every page links the official OSHRC public release, and the full text on the page is that release. The plain-English summaries are written by Ezel.