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OSHA Slaps Oklahoma Refinery Citing Safety Violations

A Sinclair owned crude oil refinery in Tulsa Oklahoma has been slapped with several safety violations after it was inspected by The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration, (OSHA).

The investigation was part of OSHA’s National Emphasis Program for Petroleum Refineries. The program seeks to insure that refineries across the nation are in compliance with OSHA’s process safety management regulations.

David Bates, OSHA’s area director in Oklahoma City said:

“Failure to effectively implement OSHA’s process safety management regulations to protect employees from potential hazards at high risk facilities, such as petrochemical refineries, will not be tolerated, this planned inspection has identified hazards for corrective action to help prevent accidents or injuries.”

The plant received one serious citation that included 38 violations. OSHA defines a serious violation as one that involves "substantial probability that death or serious physical harm could result from a hazard about which the employer knew or should have known." That citation involved problems with process safety management, portable fire extinguishers, emergency response and evacuation, benzene, hexavalent chromium, electrical problems, chemical storage, compressed gas cylinders and walking/working surfaces.

The other citation was classified by OSHA as willful, meaning the company never addressed hazards identified in an earlier OSHA inspection. This involved electrical equipment deemed capable of igniting flammable vapors, and the need for early warning devices for flammable and toxic releases.

Proposed penalties will be in the area of 240,000.

 

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This entry was posted by David Austin on Wednesday, August 5th, 2009 at 3:01 pm and is filed under Uncategorized . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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