A mine worker was killed recently after he and the bulldozer he was operating at a northern Saskatchewan mine plunged through the ice on a frozen lake.

The worker was employed by DJ’s Drilling of Aldergrove, B.C., but he was working under contract for Can-Alaska at the company’s Cree East uranium project at the time of the accident. He was clearing a small section of snow off Cree Lake in preparation for drilling when he and the bulldozer went into the water. The company has claimed that the ice had been tested before the accident, and approved the thickness of the ice, which was more than 75 centimetres deep. They have suggested that it’s possible there was a crack in the ice that went undetected, and when the bulldozer went over it, it just couldn’t handle the weight.

Other workers went into the water after him, but by then he was already apparently submerged, face down.  Because water freezes over very quickly up there, they essentially had to extricate him from the ice.  CPR was performed at the scene, but there was no response.

Can-Alaska is touting its safety record at the site, which is about 600 kilometres northeast of Buffalo Narrows, and says this is the first incident there in five years.

Beginning with new regulations that took effect February 1, 2011, the Government of Manitoba is letting everyone know it is getting serious about preventing all types of workplace harassment.

The new regulations extend protection to workers against psychological harassment. That means the definition of harassment has been broken down into two types. The first is inappropriate behavior to a person based on their race, sex, age or a categories.   The second is basically workplace bullying, which includes “severe, repeated conduct that adversely affects a worker’s psychological or physical well being,” as well as “a single occurrence, if shown to have a lasting, harmful effect on a person.”

According to the Ministry of Labour and Immigration, the new regulations have been in the works for some time, and were created based on feedback from a number of groups, including employers, labour groups, and professional and trade groups. They also listened to a number of individuals who suffered from work place harassment and learned the toll it took on their mental health. The number one reason cited for disabilities-based health leaves is mental health issues, and the new regulations were crafted in order to help with both health and productivity. The new legislation hopes to help by putting on employers the obligation to have policies to prevent harassment.

There is plenty of information available for those who would like to learn about the new laws. A brochure, available at safemanitoba.com, includes detailed examples of types of inappropriate behavior, as well as scenarios to further illustrate how the new boundaries work. For employers who need to rewrite their own harassment policies, the website also features a sample harassment prevention policy.

You may recall a terrible tragedy that occurred in August 2009, when 3-year-old Michelle Krsek and members of her family were taking relatives from Romania were walking the streets of downtown Calgary, when a windstorm hit, and they were struck by falling construction material. The little girl was killed, and her father and 7-year-old brother were injured in the incident.

Well, nearly 18 months later, two construction companies, Germain Residences of Quebec City and subcontractor Flynn Canada, have received fines of the statutory maximum $15,000 after pleading guilty to Alberta safety code violations. According to court records, the companies were charged with not properly securing a stack of roofing material.

While some have suggested that the fine sends a “strong message” to construction companies in Calgary, many others aren’t so sure, including the judge in the case.  As he made his ruling and assessed the fine, the judge expressed frustration with the provincial legislation and the maximum penalty allowed, and said the fine is “woefully inadequate.”

This particular case has served to highlight the inconsistencies with regard to provincial fines, and what many say has been poor enforcement of safety at construction sites.  For example, while the fine for this incident was capped at $15,000, if a worker had been killed by the same sheet metal that killed the three-year-old bystander, the maximum penalty to the company would have been $500,000 and/or up to six months in jail for a first offence.

Calgary Municipal Affairs Minister Hector Goudreau agrees with the judge’s assessment, and he plans to make recommendations to others in the city to make the fines much stiffer in the future.

A business consortium from India has expressed a desire to reopen the Jeffrey asbestos mine in Asbestos, Quebec, and an anti-asbestos advocacy group, the Rideau Institute, is upset about the government’s reaction to the overture.

The provincial government is considering a $58-million loan guarantee to the Indian consortium, which is led by Balcorp Inc. The lure of jobs in a down economy is cited as a major reason for even contemplating the deal. The Quebec government is considering paying for routine inspections in India to make sure the asbestos is used safely.

The Rideau Institute, however, believes it would be impossible to regulate safe use of asbestos throughout India because of the generally poor working conditions in that country. For example, when asbestos cement products are dispersed, they will end up in thousands and thousands of poor villages and slums.

The Institute also objects to the fact that Quebec’s Commission de la santé et de la sécurité du travail du Québec (CSST), their workplace health and safety board, is part of an economic mission to India next week to promote the safe use of asbestos. They say the Quebec government should not be helping to export asbestos to India, or anywhere else, for that matter.

The Northwest Territories and Nunavut have begun the process of making drastic changes to their Occupational Health and Safety Regulations (OHSR), but the proposed draft has many businesses concerned.

In fact, there were so much concern expressed by members of the NWT Construction Association and the NWT Chamber of Commerce, that the Workers’ Safety & Compensation Commission (WSCC) of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut announced an extension of the public consultation period for the OHSR to March 31, a full five months later than had originally been scheduled.  It is hoped that the extension will give businesses time to examine the proposed regulations and provide meaningful feedback to the Safety Regulation Review Committee.

The WSCC and the two territorial governments studied the regulatory framework under the current Safety Acts and found it to be “fragmented, outdated, unclear and difficult to enforce,” according to a WSCC press release. The review committee spent two years developing the draft OHSR, which would replace all regulations under the Safety Acts, including the integration of regulations related to asbestos, workplace smoking, silica and soundblasting, among others, and combine them all into a single set of regulations.

Among some of the other changes included in the draft regulations are:

• Creating an enhanced role for joint occupational health and safety committees;
• Facilitating a partnership between employers and workers for greater safety at work sites;
• Facilitating a greater use of practice guidelines, standards and codes, with employers, workers and other stakeholders taking a much greater role in their development;
• Updating requirements for personal protective equipment;
• More directly addressing unique safety issues for workers in extremely cold weather;
• More provisions for radiation safety, including protection of pregnant workers and;
• More regulations dealing with harassment and violence on the job;

Some business groups, however, have complained about what they refer to as the WSCC’s “misguided approach” to developing the new regulations. They point out that a rewrite of the rules doesn’t necessarily lead to improved safety performance in the workplace.

Some have also expressed concern over the size of the draft, which runs approximately 350 pages, which seems excessive to some. In a business climate in which 97% of businesses fit into the “small” category, they wonder how many business owners will read the whole thing and recognize the regulations that apply to them. They worry about the “one-size-fits-all” nature of the new regulations, their lack of a risk assessment component. There are also cost concerns about regulations relating to internal safety committees, additional training and the shutting down of sites if the combined temperature and wind chill drops to -45 C or lower.  A few businesses indicated that they might as well shut down for the winter under such conditions.

For their part, the WSCC acknowledges the media attention they’ve received over the cold weather regulations, and they are sensitive to many other concerns, as well. When the current consultation period ends, they will decide if more consultation is necessary. They hope to put the new regulations in effect by the spring or summer of 2012.

According to a preliminary report by WorkSafeBC, a worker who died two days after he fell 14 metres while working on the sails at Canada Place on Dec. 2 “was not using a personal fall protection system” at the time of the accident.

Apparently, the 30-year-old worker, Diego Herrera, was wearing a safety harness, but that harness was unattached  when he fell through what the report describes as a “mouse hole” in the sails.

An inspection report taken at the work site also noted a number of violations of safety regulations at the work site, including ropes, straps, webbing, electrical cords and construction debris around the mouse hole in violation of the Occupational Health and Safety Regulation. The report made it clear that there were grounds for imposing an administrative penalty against Birdair Inc. of Amherst, N.Y, the company that was hired to replace the sails at Canada Place by Ledcor Construction Ltd., which is managing the project on behalf of Canada Place Corporation.

The report read, “The employer did not have a fall protection plan for the sealing up of the mouse hole. The mouse hole was not guarded or guard-railed. The area in front of the mouse hole had many slip and trip hazards.”

No further action will be taken, however, until WorkSafeBC’s investigation of the incident is complete.

WorkSafeBC regulations stipulate that an employer must have a fall protection system in place when work is being done at heights of 3 metres or more. The $21-million project to replace the sails — originally erected in 1984 — began in July 2010 and is expected to be completed later this year.

Texting while driving is a bad idea when you’re alone in your car. But in an age when everyone seems to have a camera or video camera on their person at all times, you have to wonder about someone who goes even farther.

AToronto bus driver faces disciplinary, up to and including firing, after a passenger took a photo of him texting while operating a bus. The vehicle carried approximately 30 passengers and travelling at approximately 50 kilometres per hour at the time the photo was taken, according to the passenger-photographer.

The Toronto Transit Commission has made it clear that, in addition to being illegal, it considers such an incident as a serious breach of public safety and commission rules, and is taking this ”extremely seriously.”

Texting while driving has been illegal on Ontario roads since October 2009 and violators face fines of up to $500. But beyond that, it violates a TTC policy that was in place long before the Ontario law took effect.

The passenger who took the photo says he doesn’t want the driver to lose his job, but he also doesn’t want people texting while driving, either. He said that several passengers saw the driver texting, but no one else bothered to say anything to the driver.

This isn’t the first time a TTC employee has been caught off-guard by someone with a camera. Last January, someone photographed a fare collector sleeping on the job. Before that, a passenger took video of a driver engaged in a prolonged coffee break while passengers were on the bus, and the bus was left idling.

Officials with the Halton Regional Police Service (HRPS) in Southern Ontario are crediting a construction worker’s protective head gear for saving his life following an industrial accident on January 6.

Police received a call at about 1:10 pm, reporting an injured construction worker at a condominium construction site in Oakville.  The 31-year-old worker, an employee of EDVAC Contracting Ltd, based in Brampton, Ontario, was standing on the ground when a 3.5-metre aluminum beam, weighing approximately 30 kilograms, fell over a safety fence, plummeted eight stories and struck the worker on his head, face and right shoulder.  Emergency personnel and doctors agree that that only thing that prevented the head trauma from being more severe was his hard hat.

The worker was immediately transported to Hamilton General Hospital, where he was listed in serious but stable condition. The Ministry of Labour (MoL) immediately secured the construction site pending an investigation.

EDVAC Contracting was issued one order: to develop and implement a procedure for placing formwork that will ensure that beams cannot fall from the building. Two orders were issued to the constructor of the site, Toronto-based Dominus Construction. One order was to provide employment records for the injured worker and witness reports to the ministry; and the other was to develop and implement a procedure to eliminate workers’ exposure to overhead hazards.

The investigation into the incident continues.

At an annual meeting held on January 16 and 17 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, federal, provincial and territorial labour ministers discussed a number of issues and reaffirmed their continuing commitment to safe workplaces, to protect workers and employers.

The get-together was co-hosted by the Honourable Lisa Raitt, Canada’s Labour Minister, and the Honourable Jennifer Howard, Minister of Labour and Immigration for Manitoba.

Minister Raitt asserted that the Canadian Government’s top priority was the economy and that “safe and healthy workplaces boost productivity and innovation,” and that “the well-being of workers and employers are key to the success and performance of Canada’s economy.”

According to Minister Howard, “Safe and healthy working environments do not just happen, they require a commitment by governments and everyone at the workplace. … Manitoba has long enjoyed a reputation as a leader in workplace health and safety issues and we want to continue to build on our successes.”

The meeting included discussions of Canada’s international labour activities, and endorsed a renewed strategy for Canada’s work as part of the International Labour Organization. They agreed to work together to develop programs that use social media and other tools to enhance the occupational health and safety of young workers.  They also participated in panel discussions regarding the evolution of work and possible long-range labor policy, with an emphasis on labour relations, employment standards, and mental health in the workplace.

The labour ministers’ meeting is an annual event, but ongoing work continues throughout the year, through the Canadian Association of Administrators of Labour Legislation (CAALL). Established in 1938, CAALL is an association of federal-provincial-territorial departments of labour and heads of occupational health and safety agencies.

There has been a rash of accidents involving snowplows in Saskatchewan lately. The latest incident involves a provincial snowplow that was hit  by a semi-trailer on the Trans-Canada Highway on Sunday afternoon, January 16. It was actually the third such incident in less than two weeks.

According to the Highways Ministry, the latest accident occurred during whiteout conditions near Balgonie. The semi swerved and hit the snowplow on the right rear side, causing extensive damage to both vehicles. Neither driver was injured.

That particular crash followed a more serious accident on Highway 40 near Shellbrook on Friday morning, January 14, in which a snowplow operator was plowing in the southbound lanes of the highway when a northbound car crossed into the wrong lane and hit the snowplow head on. The driver of the car in that accident was treated for minor injuries, while two passengers — a woman and a small child — received non-life-threatening injuries.

Another snowplow was hit by a car around noon on Jan. 6. In that incident, the operator had been plowing on Highway 19 near Elbow when he was rear-ended.  According to the Ministry’s report, the driver had entered the whiteout created by the plow before the crash.

Here are some basic safety tips for all drivers when operating near snowplows:

• Stay alert! If you’re on a major road and it’s snowing, there are likely to be plows working.
• Note that snowplows travel slower than posted speeds, and always yield to them.
• Remember that a snowplow weighs far more than a car, and a crash is more likely to do more damage to you and your vehicle than the snowplow and its operator.
• Give snowplow operators plenty of room to do their jobs.
• Never drive into a snow cloud.
• Never use cruise control on wet or icy roads.
• Slow down and be patient. Allow for a safe distance between your vehicle and a snowplow.

Wait until the snowplow pulls over (they do so every 10km) to pass.