Friday, February 11, 2000
8 violations in wall collapse, injuries
BY JENNY CALLISON
Enquirer Contributor
OXFORD — A masonry contractor whose 35-foot concrete block wall collapsed Jan. 10 in Oxford has been cited by OSHA for eight “serious” violations.
Dennis Slessman , assistant area director for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, said Thursday that his office sent a citation and notification of penalty to Jeff's Masonry of Fort Thomas.
Several employees of Jeff's Masonry were injured when the wall they were building at 30 W. Park Place suddenly toppled. Four were treated at McCullough-Hyde Hospital in Oxford and a fifth was flown by helicopter to Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton.
Jeff Peshek, owner of the company, declined comment on the citations, but said all of the injured — including himself — are recovering from their injuries.
The construction project was a new facility for Lebanon Citi zens National Bank.
“We issued a serious citation containing eight alleged violations,” Mr. Slessman said. “The company has a 15-working-day period in which they have the right to request an informal conference with the area director (of OSHA) to contest the citations or to comply and pay the penalty.”
Mr. Slessman said that Jeff's Masonry has requested an informal conference to discuss the citation.
The penalty mentioned in the citation is $12,000.
Mr. Slessman said the term “serious violation” under OSHA definition involves the probability that death or serious physical harm could result from the violation and that the employer knew or should have known of the hazard.
The eight violations:
• Inspections of the job site prior to the accident were not conducted by a person competent to identify hazards connected with protective equipment, scaffolding and bracing of the concrete block wall.
• Employees were not instructed to recognize and avoid unsafe conditions, especially that of working on inadequate scaffolding adjacent to an unbraced wall.
• Employees were not wearing protective helmets (hard hats).
• The scaffolding on which workers were standing was not reinforced according to manufacturer's recommendations.
• The scaffolding did not have guardrailing to prevent employees from falling.
• The scaffolding end frames were not properly locked together.
• Protruding pieces of reinforcing steel on the construction site were not capped to prevent injury. Mr. Peshek was impaled on a metal bar as he fell off the scaffolding.
• The concrete block wall was not braced or otherwise reinforced to prevent collapse. OSHA regulations specify that masonry walls over 8 feet tall must be braced until permanent structural supports are in place.
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