This year, GBCA, OSHA, the Mid-Atlantic Construction Safety Council, the Philadelphia Building Trades Council, and the Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters are working together to promote awareness of fall hazards on the jobsite as part of the nationwide safety campaign, May 2 – 6, 2022. As part of this campaign, which includes the National Safety Stand Down to Prevent Falls in Construction in May, we are promoting fall protection equipment inspections (FPEI).

Fall protection equipment should be regularly inspected and removed if in poor condition or past its date of effectiveness. General contractors will be principally responsible for conducting on-site inspections of fall protection equipment and removals. OSHA and the Mid-Atlantic Construction Safety Council have created a Smartsheet to help record and report on keeping jobsite equipment up to date.

In preparation for this year’s campaign, we are offering two trainings:

Fall Protection Training
Date: April 14, 2022
Time: 9:00am – 10:30am
Location: Finishing Trades Institute, 2190 Hornig Road, Philadelphia, PA 19116

This FREE training is open (no registration necessary!), and would benefit apprentice training coordinators and staff, signatory contractors, OSHA compliance officers, business agents, safety professionals, etc.

OSHA Fall Protection Campaign Kickoff
Date: April 20, 2022
Time: 12pm
Location: ONLINE (via Microsoft Teams)

During this meeting, Jim Touey, Labor Liaison for OSHA, and Jenn Hall, Senior Safety Manager for P. Agnes, Inc., will go over how to submit data to OSHA through the Fall Protection Equipment Inspection Smartsheet for participating contractors.

Plan a Fall Protection Equipment Inspection Stand Down Event

We are encouraging GBCA members to dedicate time in May to inspecting fall protection equipment. If you’re interested in hosting an onsite Stand Down in conjunction with your inspection, please contact us (Fran Petriccione, Brian Eddis, and James Hocker) for support in planning and scheduling:

Contact Jim Touey for support and participation from OSHA in your event. OSHA can also provide 2022 fall hazards prevention campaign posters and hard hat stickers.

To help share the Smartsheet with your team, download this QR code that will lead to the online form:

Employers that participate will be able to provide feedback about their campaign efforts and download a Certificate of Participation from OSHA’s website. The last large Fall Protection Equipment Inspection campaign run in our region was in 2018. That year, 29 jobsites participated and 9% of fall protection equipment was removed from service.

Fatalities caused by falls from elevation continue to be a leading cause of death for construction employees, accounting for 351 of the 1,008 construction fatalities recorded in 2020 (BLS data). CPWR’s Construction Focus Four Dashboard shows trends that fall fatalities continued to increase, from 260 (2011) to 401 (2019). Those deaths were preventable. The National Safety Stand-Down raises fall hazard awareness across the country in an effort to stop fall fatalities and injuries.

For more information on OSHA’s National Safety Stand-Down to Prevent Falls in Construction as well as publications, tool-box talks and other training modules please visit OSHA’s website.