Text For Citation: 01 Item/Group: 001 Hazard: UNAPEQUIP

Section 5(a)(1) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970: The employer did not furnish employment and a place of employment which were free from recognized hazards that were causing, or likely to cause, death or serious physical harm to employees in that employees were exposed to fall hazards from wheeled equipment rolling and falling from flatbed trailers during loading and unloading operations: At the employer's equipment yard employees routinely load and unload heavy equipment such as, but not limited to, Genie aerial lifts onto flatbed trailers which are not equipped with side rails to prevent equipment roll-off.The employer does not have a loading and unloading operational procedures/control plan for when employees are instructed to load and unload various pieces of heavy equipment for transportation. Among other methods, feasible and acceptable abatement methods to correct these hazards would be to: (a) Develop and implement a written operating procedural for the loading and unloading heavy equipment onto flat bed trailers. (b) Develop an adequate method to communicate to employees that when there are possible safety related equipment problems the employees should be able to communicate it in writing with a tag and remove the equipment from service. (c) Develop a procedure for equipment inspection prior to loading and unloading at the equipment yard and the equipment's destination/utilization point. (d) Use only flat bed trailers equipped with side rails for transport of heavy equipment.