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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Basic Energy Services
Well-rig stair and guardrail violations affirmed
Basic Energy Services provided well-servicing work at an oil and gas well near Hawkins, Texas. OSHA observed employees working on an elevated rig platform where stairs between platform levels were broken and replaced with a box, and a roughly six-foot section of guardrail was missing. The judge…
Longhorn Service Company
Mixed ruling on well-rig fall and fire hazards
Longhorn Service Company operated a well-servicing rig near Alexander, North Dakota. The judge affirmed serious items involving an unguarded hole in the rig floor, an inadequately guarded open platform, and improperly maintained and inspected fire extinguishers. A repeat stair-railing item was also…
McWane, Inc., d/b/a Atlantic States Cast Iron Pipe Company
Fixed-stair rule applied to earthen pit
Atlantic States Cast Iron Pipe Company used a seven-foot-deep earthen pit to capture molten metal spilled during its pipe manufacturing process. Employees entered the pit each workday to remove debris, but no fixed stairs or ladder were in use when OSHA inspected. The company argued that the fixed…
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…
Pool Company Texas, Ltd.
Commission approves a settlement withdrawing the fixed-stairs railing citation and sets aside the ALJ decision
Pool Company Texas runs oil-and-gas well-servicing (workover) rigs. During a January 1999 inspection at a lease near Peyote, Texas, OSHA cited the company because two sets of stairs leading up to the rig's operating platforms lacked a standard railing on one open side. The administrative law judge…
Metal Recycling Company
Scrap-yard hazards yield mixed ruling and $400 penalty
OSHA inspected Metal Recycling Company's three-employee scrap-metal facility in El Paso, Texas, and issued a serious citation with multiple items. The judge affirmed serious violations involving unsecured access stairs, an exit leading into a blocked and fenced yard, obstructed aisles, hazardous…
General Electric Co.
Settlement remanded for employee-union input
GE and the Secretary submitted a settlement stating that the employee union had participated in negotiations, but the union told the ALJ that it had been excluded. The ALJ approved the agreement only five days after it was mailed to the union, without allowing the required ten-day response period…
Stone Container Corporation
Repeated crane manbasket violation affirmed
Stone Container used cranes to lift employees in personnel baskets under a prior settlement that required a full-cycle test lift carrying twice the intended load before employees were raised. Crane operators testified that the required weighted tests were not performed on several occasions and that…
Harrison Furniture Manufacturing Company
Commission approves withdrawal of all citations
OSHA cited Harrison Furniture Manufacturing Company for numerous conditions at its Arkansas furniture plant after an inspection conducted under a warrant. The earlier litigation addressed whether evidence from a plant-wide inspection should be suppressed when the warrant application was based on…
Simmons, Inc.
Compressed-air and elevated-work violations affirmed
Simmons employees regularly removed reduction nozzles and used compressed air above 30 p.s.i. to clean cotton from machinery. The Commission rejected the company's arguments that this was unknown misconduct or production work outside the cleaning rule, and it treated the condition as a separate…
Jess Howard Electric Co.
Fixed-stair citation for a mobile trailer vacated
Jess Howard Electric was cited at a construction site in Whitehall, Ohio, for not providing an access stairway to a tool trailer. OSHA relied on the general-industry standard requiring fixed industrial stairs for regular travel between structure levels and access to operating platforms. The…
Tobacco River Lumber Co.
Mixed ruling on thirty sawmill citation items
Tobacco River operated a Montana sawmill and planing mill that received a thirty-item citation covering housekeeping, stairs, protective equipment, fire safety, tools, gas cylinders, machinery, and electrical conditions. The Commission upheld the inspection because a company employee with authority…
Pratt & Whitney Aircraft, A Div. of United Aircraft Corp.
Locked-exit violation affirmed with reduced penalty
Pratt & Whitney assembled and tested rocket and jet engines in a large room that held as many as 150 employees and contained flammable liquids and several possible ignition sources. Six of the room's seven exits were locked for security, and employees were sometimes locked inside for ten to thirty…
Sigman Meat Co.
Stair and sanitation items restored under OSHA jurisdiction
Sigman Meat operated a pork slaughterhouse and contested multiple non-serious safety and health items. The judge affirmed four of nine disputed items, vacated five, and assessed $117. The Commission held that Department of Agriculture meat-inspection rules did not displace OSHA jurisdiction over…
Milprint, Inc.
Fixed-stair item vacated for lack of proof
OSHA issued Milprint 13 non-serious citation items covering conditions at its Milwaukee plant. The judge affirmed nine items and vacated four, assessing penalties totaling $280. On review, the Commission reversed the fixed-stair item because OSHA did not prove that employees regularly used the…
Spencer Foods, Inc.
Two items vacated and all penalties eliminated
OSHA cited Spencer Foods for multiple non-serious conditions at its meat-processing plant, including access, ladder, guarding, fire-safety, vehicle, and protective-equipment issues. The judge found that the Secretary had not proved that a fixed ladder was covered by the cited portable-ladder rule…
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.