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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Peacock Timber Company, Inc.
Lockout, respirator, and noise items affirmed
Peacock Timber operated a seven-employee sawmill in Troy, Alabama. The judge affirmed a serious lockout/tagout item because employees serviced multi-energy-source mill equipment without documented machine-specific procedures. An other-than-serious respirator item was affirmed because employees…
Gipson-Ricketts, LLC
Lead protection items affirmed for shooting-range recovery work
Gipson-Ricketts recovered lead shot from a shooting range by screening dry, dusty topsoil. The judge treated the work as general industry rather than construction because the company's primary activity was collecting lead and returning the soil, not permanently changing the site. Employees used…
Southern Scrap Materials Co., Inc.
Lead, cadmium, first-aid, and guarding violations yield $114,500 penalty
Southern Scrap Materials operated a Louisiana scrap-recycling facility where workers torch cut metal and used industrial machinery. The Commission rejected the company's broad challenges to OSHA's inspection, testing, and the validity of the lead and cadmium standards. It found that Southern…
Lewis County Dairy Corp.
Widespread safety violations result in $72,750 penalty
OSHA found extensive safety deficiencies at Lewis County Dairy's kosher dairy plant, including missing safety programs, inadequate lockout practices, unguarded equipment, electrical hazards, deficient fall protection, and insufficient hazard communication. Of the 33 serious citation items, the…
Luna Tech, Inc.
Settlement approved with $50,000 in combined penalties
The two cases arose from OSHA inspections of Luna Tech's fireworks-manufacturing plant, including an inspection after explosions and fires injured three employees and one later died. While the cases were under Commission review, the parties settled all remaining issues. The Secretary withdrew…
LTV Steel Company, Inc., United Steel Workers of America, District 1, Local Union 188, Authorized Employee Representative
First-aid coverage citation vacated
LTV reduced one of its two steel-mill infirmaries to daytime hours after constructing a bridge connecting the mill's east and west sides. OSHA alleged that west-side employees lacked a nearby medical facility and adequately trained first-aid personnel during evening hours. The judge found that the…
Coastal Petroleum Services, Inc.
Remote-site first-aid violation affirmed
A Coastal well-servicing rig overturned at a remote Mississippi oil well, killing one crew member and seriously injuring another. The judge vacated a general duty allegation concerning the mast's guylines and anchors because OSHA did not produce the manufacturer's specifications for the particular…
C-Post
Willful lockout and guarding citations cut to serious after a small fence-post maker's amputation injury
C-Post is a small Montana company that makes wooden fence posts and furniture legs from logs, employing about 10 people. After a worker's left hand was severed in a doweler machine, OSHA inspected and issued a long list of serious, willful, repeat, and other-than-serious citations covering…
Mid City Motors
Settlement affirms four serious items with a $750 total penalty
OSHA inspected Mid City Motors and issued a citation alleging three serious violations with proposed penalties totaling $2,850. When the hearing opened, the parties reached an agreement resolving every issue. Their stipulation, incorporated into the order by reference, treated the third item as two…
Well Solutions, Inc., Rig No. 30
Blowout-preventer and training violations affirmed
A Well Solutions crew was changing a pump at a horizontal oil well in south Texas when a blowout and fire killed two employees and seriously injured two others. The Commission found that the well-servicing industry recognized the need for a blowout preventer under the conditions at this relatively…
Well Solutions, Inc.
Open-fields evidence reinstates rig-safety violations
An OSHA inspector first visited Well Solutions' oil-well rig without a warrant and observed unguarded platforms and employees without hard hats from an accessible road and field. The judge suppressed those observations and vacated the citations. The Commission held that the open-fields doctrine…
D.A. & S. Oil Well Servicing, Inc.
Respirator violation became final after review brief was missed
D.A. & S. serviced an oil and gas well in an area where highly toxic hydrogen sulfide could be encountered, but it had no emergency respirators at the site. The judge found that engineering controls could fail and affirmed a serious respiratory-protection violation with a $280 penalty. He vacated…
Consolidated Rail Corporation
Guarding items vacated and first-aid item affirmed
OSHA cited Conrail's Ohio diesel repair shop for an unguarded drop-table opening, incomplete safety chains on locomotive work ramps, and lack of trained first-aid personnel when no hospital was nearby. The Commission held that a Federal Railroad Administration policy statement exercised authority…
Snyder Well Servicing, Inc.
Respirator item affirmed and other well-site items vacated
Snyder used a mobile service rig to swab a newly drilled Texas oil well, removing material from the well bore. The Commission held that swabbing had not been shown to be construction work, so construction standards did not apply. It nevertheless affirmed a serious general-industry respiratory…
Savina Home Industries, Inc.
Failure-to-abate notification vacated
Savina received a failure-to-abate notification after a follow-up inspection concerning an injury log, first-aid training, and a welding hood hanging on a fire extinguisher. The Commission explained that a prima facie failure-to-abate case requires a final original citation and the identical…
John Hoaglin Auto Trim
Low-gravity shop violations affirmed with $75 total penalty
John Hoaglin Auto Trim contested only the penalties for ten admitted nonserious violations. The items included floor debris creating a trip hazard, naphtha stored in an unapproved container, unguarded sewing-machine belts, uncovered electrical outlet boxes, and ungrounded sewing and vending…
Penrod Drilling Company
General duty citation vacated over hazard recognition
Penrod employees were preparing to dismantle an oil derrick and worked from a girder about 125 feet above the ground without safety belts. One employee stepped onto the bridle assembly, the sling broke, and he fell to his death. OSHA alleged a serious general duty clause violation and proposed a…
Love Box Company
First-aid violation affirmed
Love Box manufactured corrugated boxes and employed about 151 workers. The Commission held that the company needed a person trained in first aid on its second shift because the nearest hospital was about nine minutes away, and it assessed a $25 penalty. It vacated an aisle-obstruction item because…
Midwest By Products, Inc.
First-aid and LP-gas items reinstated, ladder item vacated
OSHA cited hazards at Midwest By Products' rendering plant, including unguarded screw conveyors, defective ladders, inadequate first-aid preparation, an unsafe grinder, electrical defects, and an unprotected propane tank. The company admitted most of the nonserious violations and later acknowledged…
Charles A. Davison & Margaret S. Davison, dba Davison Wood Products
Machine-guarding items affirmed without penalties
OSHA cited a small woodworking business for unguarded sanding machines, a jointer, saw belts and pulleys, and a rip saw, along with alleged electrical, spray-booth ventilation, and first-aid violations. The judge affirmed the four machine-guarding items without penalties. He vacated the electrical…
Painting Unlimited, Inc.
Unsafe access upheld, ladder side-rail item vacated
Painting Unlimited was spray-painting bridge girders from a scaffold more than 40 feet above the ground. Employees had to hoist themselves about four feet from the scaffold to the girder because no suitable ladder, stairway, ramp, or runway provided safe access. The Commission affirmed that access…
Modern Automotive Service, Inc.
Foot-protection item affirmed and first-aid item vacated
Modern Automotive serviced and repaired trucks, and its employees manually handled tools, parts, and materials weighing as much as 60 pounds. The company had experienced toe injuries over five years, and its safety director acknowledged that foot protection would have prevented some of them. The…
Sunpruf Aluminum Products, Inc.
Eight safety items affirmed without penalties
Sunpruf manufactured aluminum storm windows and doors at a Nashville plant with about 30 employees. OSHA cited conditions involving electrical boxes, compressed air, respiratory and welding protection, personal protective equipment, first aid, housekeeping, and aisle marking. The Secretary withdrew…
Santa Fe Trail Transport Co.
Decision amended to state that no penalty was assessed
This short amendment corrects the Commission's decision issued two days earlier. That decision had incorrectly stated that the judge assessed a $50 penalty for violations involving the first-aid standard. The amendment states that the judge assessed no penalty and orders the earlier decision…
Apex Paper Box Co.
Fire-extinguisher inspection item vacated
OSHA issued Apex Paper Box 19 non-serious citation items covering fire protection, electrical conditions, exits, housekeeping, industrial trucks, records, and first aid. The judge affirmed all 19 items and assessed penalties totaling $731.25. The Commission vacated only the fire-extinguisher…
Clavier Corporation
Ten safety items affirmed and two vacated
Clavier Corporation researched, developed, and manufactured electrical equipment in New York. OSHA issued a 12-item citation covering conditions that included compressed-gas cylinders, machine guarding, first-aid readiness, compressed-air cleaning, flammable-liquid containers, and electrical…
J. E. Chilton Millwork & Lumber Company, Inc.
Six items affirmed with no penalties
OSHA cited J. E. Chilton Millwork for seven non-serious violations involving first aid, housekeeping, lunch space, extinguisher inspections, toilet partitions, equipment grounding, and compressed-air cleaning. The judge treated the toilet-partition item as de minimis, vacated that citation and…
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.