1

Q. 1

In the section 5(a)(1) of OSHA, some unforeseen hazards that may cause harm to

the employee are covered. There are those dangers in the work place that OSHA rules might not

have covered but yet they remain a threat to the violation of the employee’s safety. Therefore,

osha came up with this clause with an aim to cover such issues. These dangers vary f4rom one

company to the other and hence each employer has to take care of their employees according to

the context of the place they work. These dangers include all those risks that can cause physical

harm or death of an employee, such as workplace violence.

Elements for justification of general duty clause

There are several elements that could validate the use of the general clause and they

include:

1. The ignorance of the employer in seen a risk that could harm the

employees and failing to take action towards eradicating it. For example, if employees

are not in good terms and the employer fails to meditate them then, the clause applies on t

he incidence of its occurrence.

2. The hazard was valid and also recognized.

3. The hazard had a high probability of occurring or it occurred hence

injuring or killing the employee(s).

4. The foreseen hazard had a feasible method of control.

In my opinion, the introduction of the clause was a good thing for it protects the

employees even from the unforeseen hazards. However, I guess the compliance officers

in OSHA may have a hard time proving whether the clause applies in case of an
 2

occurrence of accident and other hazards. For example, it is difficult to determine

whether the employer had prior knowledge of the occurrence of the incidence and did

nothing about it.

 3

Q. 2

As the environmental health and safety officer in our company, I am obliged to

provide the statistics for the Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR). Generally, for the

whole year from January to December, there were 3 recorded injuries that were fatal. The

total number of hours worked for the 12 months were 247, 548. Therefore, calculating the

TRIR:

TRIR =total no. of recoded injuries × 200000 / total hours worked

= 3×200000/247548

According to Osha form 300 and 300A, the above method was delivered

considering a company with more than 250 employees (such as ours) is supposed to keep

records of the TRIR, and by march of the preceding year, it is supposed to produce copies

of such document and provide them to their employees. Therefore, I used this formular

as provided by OSHA.

The recorded injury I provided include work injuries and sickness that may lead

to medical treatment, death, absenteeism from work, loss of consciousness or transfer to

another job. The number 200000 is provided by OSHA as a benchmark representing the

HOURS 100 employees working 50 weeks a year and 40 hours a week. The total hours

worked by the employees of our company excluded vacation hours and leave hours such

as maternity and paternity leave. It included temporary employees working under our

management.
4