OSHA’s top 10 most frequently cited workplace safety standards for fiscal year 2024 were recently announced at the NSC Safety Congress & Expo in Orlando.
If you’ve been paying attention to the rankings over the years, you’ll no doubt have felt an intense sensation of déjà vu with this latest announcement. Not only are the same 10 violations cited year after year but for the previous 14 consecutive years, Fall Protection – General Requirements (1926.501) has been in the number one spot.
This standard outlines the fall protection system requirements to protect employees on walking or working surfaces with an unprotected side or edge six feet off the ground or higher. The citations are for failing to protect workers from avoidable falls due to a lack of training and fall arrest systems, improper fall protection equipment, and ineffective equipment.
The duty to meet fall protection standards has not changed, and people are very aware of the risks associated with fall protection. So why does it continue to be the most frequently cited violation on job sites?
Our guide Raising the Bar: A Safety Guide to Working at Heights sums it up best:
“There are several factors conspiring against workers once their feet leave the ground.
Complacency and the normalization of risk lulls experienced workers into a false sense of comfort—and leads them to take riskier actions.
Compounding risk makes a bad situation worse—and often workers don’t even realize it.
Human error can strike anyone at any time—especially as people rush or become tired.
Supervisory effectiveness can dramatically sway the risk of working at heights—either positively or negatively.”
People generally do not want to be cited for violating this standard—for both financial reasons and to avoid having the poor reputation that comes with non-compliance. But it would be even worse if a tragedy occurred as a result of this violation. Let’s not forget that a failure to comply with the Fall Protection – General Requirements standard makes the mental and physical states we experience like exhaustion and rushing much more dangerous. All too often, human factors are the underlying cause of accidents and incidents, and unless you’re asking the question of why something happened, you may not find the cause.
The plan, provide and train approach to fall prevention is the best way to prepare for all incident causes, including human factors:
- PLAN ahead to get the job done safely. Working at heights is not just an up-and-down job. In order to ensure safety, every risk must be considered, including human factors.
- PROVIDE the right equipment. A big part of why people are being cited is that workers do not have the right ladders, scaffolding or safety gear for the job they’re performing. The right equipment for the job should be determined in the planning stage when the risk assessment is done.
- TRAIN everyone to use the equipment safely. But also train the workers to understand how to navigate all of the hazards on the job, including those impacted by human factors.
Based on old lists of OSHA’s most-cited standards (like these from 2015 and 2017), it’s a sure bet that organizations will continue to be written up for failing to meet the Fall Protection – General Requirements standard. For decades, workers have been aware of this problem but their desire to get things done in as little time as possible, combined with other human factors like complacency, fatigue and frustration, can make them vulnerable to making critical errors that increase their risk of falling.
Safety pros need to intervene if change is going to happen, and they may as well start at the top of OSHA’s list. Gravity and human factors are a hazardous combination, and if they aren’t addressed workers run the risk of injury or death. Why not try to get ahead of the problem and help break Fall Protection’s top citation streak? Raising the Bar: A Safety Guide to Working at Heights is an excellent place to start to get the conversation flowing when it comes to keeping workers safe after they leave the ground.