Quartz and Stone Creations of New Hampshire LLC: OSHA silica citation

Inspection reason: An employee died on July 19, 2019, when a stone slab fell from a storage rack and crushed them.

Silica dust findings

• No monitoring of worker silica exposure was done by the company.
• Records of monitoring kept by the company were not adequate.

Hazards cited alongside the silica issues

• The forklifts the company used had been improperly modified, which reduced their lifting capacity and compromised safe operation. The company also kept defective forklifts in service and fell short on inspecting them.
• Employees received no training, and the company let them work and walk under raised forklift booms.
• Other items OSHA cited included a lockout/tagout program that wasn't adequate, missing eye protection, electric shock hazards, machinery without guards, an emergency exit ladder that couldn't be reached, exit signs that were unmarked or blocked, and a fire extinguisher that hadn't been inspected.

The employer's time to answer the citation: Once it received the citations and penalties, the company had 15 working days to comply, to ask OSHA's area director for an informal conference, or to challenge the findings before the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, an independent body.

For anyone who held a job at Quartz and Stone Creations of New Hampshire

In the US, shops doing quartz and other engineered stone cutting now account for most new silicosis cases. If your work at Quartz and Stone Creations of New Hampshire in Northwood included cutting, grinding, or polishing slabs, you may be able to seek workers' comp from the employer's insurance and sue the companies that made the stone.