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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Conagra Flour Milling Company
Commission splits flour-mill safety citations and assesses $500
Conagra operated a flour-milling facility in Martins Creek, Pennsylvania, where OSHA cited battery servicing, powered industrial trucks, machine guarding, compressed-air cleaning, and grain-handling practices. The Commission vacated the personal-protective-equipment and eyewash items because OSHA's…
Hackney Brighton Corporation
Exit and cylinder-storage violations reinstated
Hackney Brighton fabricated steel pressure vessels at a Lancaster, Pennsylvania, facility. One designated exit was four feet above the floor with no stairs or ramp, and an acetylene cylinder delivered late in the day remained overnight in the oxygen-cylinder storage area. The judge vacated both…
Alaska Trawl Fisheries, Inc.
OSHA jurisdiction over factory vessels affirmed
Alaska Trawl Fisheries and Golden Age Fisheries operated vessels that caught and processed fish near Dutch Harbor, Alaska. OSHA cited machine guarding, passageway, recordkeeping, welding-gas storage, and hazard-communication conditions aboard the vessels. The companies stipulated to the violations…
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…
Trinity Industries, Inc.
Six truck-shop and fuel-shed items remanded
Six citation items involved conditions in a fuel-pump shed and truck shop at Trinity Industries' manufacturing plant. The judge vacated them after finding that workers in those areas belonged to an independent transportation contractor. The Commission found the record unclear as to whether the…
Grossman Steel & Aluminum Corp.
Multiple construction-site charges vacated
Grossman Steel was an iron subcontractor at a Veterans Administration hospital project and faced fire-protection, cylinder-storage, extinguisher, and falling-material allegations. The Commission vacated the general duty clause charge because Grossman's employees neither used nor had reason to use…
Oil Sales & Processing Corporation
Defective access-ladder items affirmed, lifesaving-equipment items vacated
Oil Sales & Processing performed ship repair and tank cleaning at piers in Bayonne, New Jersey. Employees used a repaired wooden ladder as the only access to a vessel even though it had a broken side rail, inadequate extension above the deck, and insufficient securing against displacement. The…
Idaho Travertine Corporation
Most stone-processing citations affirmed with penalties reduced to $125
Idaho Travertine Corporation processed quarried stone at a small plant in Idaho Falls. OSHA issued one serious radial-saw citation and 13 nonserious items covering noise, personal protective equipment, machinery, compressed gas, emergency flushing, exits, and housekeeping. The judge affirmed the…
Collator Corporation
Press-brake subitems vacated and remaining citation affirmed
Collator Corporation manufactured collating machines at a Seattle plant. Its notice of contest referred only to the proposed penalties, but its answer and statements at the hearing showed that it also intended to contest two press-brake guarding subitems. The Commission therefore treated those…
Seaboard Coast Line Railroad Co.; Winston-Salem Southbound Railway Co.
Railroad safety citations affirmed
Seaboard Coast Line admitted three nonserious safety violations, and Winston-Salem Southbound was cited because employees used a stationary caboose office without a fire extinguisher reliably available within 50 feet. Both railroads argued that Federal Railroad Administration authority exempted the…
Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad Company
Railroad exemption and bankruptcy defenses rejected
OSHA cited the railroad after inspections at its Kansas City and Joliet workplaces, and the company argued that Department of Transportation authority displaced OSHA jurisdiction and that a bankruptcy injunction barred the proceedings. The Commission held that the statutory exemption for another…
Idaho Travertine Corporation
Mine-safety jurisdiction dismissal reversed and case remanded
Idaho Travertine quarried large stone blocks at remote sites and transported them to an Idaho Falls plant for cutting, honing, polishing, and finishing. OSHA issued one serious citation and 12 nonserious citations with $1,290 in proposed penalties, but the judge vacated them because he placed the…
Stoughton Body, Inc.
Serious fire hazards affirmed and warehouse item vacated
Stoughton Body faced one four-part serious citation and thirteen nonserious items involving compressed-gas and gasoline storage, welding fumes and screens, work platforms, spray painting, electrical equipment, housekeeping, exits, and firefighting equipment. The Commission held that the company…
United Engineers & Constructors, Inc.
Repeat rebar violation affirmed and two items vacated
At the Three Mile Island construction site, one employee stood untied on a crane girder about 225 feet above the floor while guiding another crane. Safety nets would have blocked the lift, and the Commission divided over whether a feasible safety-belt anchorage had been proved, leaving 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…
Illinois Central Gulf Railroad Co.
Forty-six citation items vacated as untimely
OSHA cited 46 alleged safety, health, recordkeeping, and posting violations at Illinois Central Gulf Railroad's locomotive repair facility in Paducah, Kentucky. The inspection was coordinated with the Federal Railroad Administration, and the proposed citation moved through regional and national…
Brown-Lane Company
Settlement vacates cylinder items and affirms scaffold penalties
Brown-Lane was constructing additional facilities for an affiliated open-pit clay mining operation in Louisiana. OSHA cited five conditions involving gas cylinders and scaffolding, with proposed penalties of $40 each for the two scaffold items. In a settlement, the Secretary agreed to vacate the…
Smoke-Craft, Inc.
Sausage-cutting PPE citation vacated
Smoke-Craft manufactured beef jerky and sausage and used a hand-held reciprocating saw to cut long sausages. An employee held the sausage with a bare hand about one to one-and-a-half inches from the blade during end cuts. The Commission acknowledged a cutting hazard but vacated the…
CAM Industries, Inc.
Confined-space welding ventilation item reinstated
CAM Industries fabricated steel products and received a multi-item citation covering electrical, welding, housekeeping, eye protection, crane, platform, and recordkeeping conditions. During OSHA's inspection, an employee was welding inside a roughly 100-cubic-foot tank while an available exhaust…
Lundell Manufacturing Co., Inc.
Gasoline vent classified as serious with a $25 penalty
Lundell Manufacturing had an underground gasoline tank whose vent ended 6 feet 7 inches above the ground instead of the required 12 feet. The vent was outside, about 75 feet from the building, protected by a guard and fence, and away from regular employee work, and the company had it extended…
American Motors Corporation
Welding-ventilation item vacated and $254 assessed
OSHA cited American Motors for 29 non-serious conditions at its Milwaukee automobile plant. After withdrawals, admissions, and a hearing, the administrative law judge affirmed 17 items, vacated 12, and assessed $279. Commission review focused on a welding station where no mechanical ventilation was…
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.