The Safety Digest: Recent Episodes
Tony M. Barker
The Safety Digest addresses workplace safety and the prevention of occupational accidents, injuries, and losses. The Safety Digest focuses on the importance of protecting workers and preventing accidental losses, which negatively impacts workers, families, employers, and society. The show discusses how organizational leadership must address occupational losses to ensure employee safety, organizational efficiencies, and operational proficiency. The Safety Digest covers safety with a concentrated focus on how safety impacts organizational performance metrics in relation to productivity, profitability, and valuations. Safety is a key metric for all internal and external stakeholders, and The Safety Digest discusses proven and innovative ways to promote positive performance for both employers and employees without compromising safety.
Have you ever heard of the “The Hawk’s Nest Incident”? If not, well you are not alone, because I was completely unaware of the unfortunate events surrounding “The Hawk’s Nest Incident”. The incident was a workplace tragedy where poor migrant construction workers were exposed to occupational hazards associated with silica resulting in the death of over 750 men. Many of workers who died from the occupational exposures were poor white and underprivileged black men who were trying to support themselves and their families. These men were not provided with adequate personal protection equipment (PPE) and engineering controls which would have mitigated the occupational exposure. The construction owner (Union Carbide) failed to ensure adequate protection for the workers to promote employee health and safety. The tragedy occurred prior to workers’ compensation laws being fully adopted, enacted, and implementation of workplace safety standards.
Dr. Martin Cherniack, M.D., M.P.H. writes a compelling account of the tragedy and tells the story of how the construction companies, managers, and leadership failed to protect the men from the debilitating occupational exposure resulting in injuries and death. Many of the migrant workers never made it back home due to dying on the job. Numerous construction workers were improperly buried at the jobsite without notification of their families and loved ones. Dr. Cherniack interview reveals the importance of the tragedy and how occupational illnesses are preventable.
The story is tragedy, and it is essential for us to never allow it to be repeated. Today, we must work to ensure employee health and safety is paramount for all workers regardless of their education, race, or social status. Together we can make a difference in workplace safety, because “safety is a value”.
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In his book "The Hawk's Nest Incident", Dr. Martin Cherniack, M.D., addresses the worst industrial disaster in U.S. history. Dr. Cherniack, served at NIOSH (National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health) and played a major role in the establishment of OSHA Recommended Exposure Limit (REL) for work place safety from hazardous substances. Dr. Cherniack provides a comprehensive analysis and study in "The Hawk' Nest Incident" which resulted in the deaths of over 751 plus men at Union Carbide’s construction site in West Virginia. Dr. Cherniack provides a comprehensive study of the horrific workplace conditions that led to the tragic death of hundreds of healthy men. Dr. Cherniack highlights how the incident was completely preventable and avoidable.
Dr. Cherniack addresses how policies and procedures were in place to adequately protect the workers; yet, the construction company hired by Union Carbide failed to consider the health and safety of the workers. The workers' health and safety was completely ignored, because of the men's race, educational level, and economic status. The construction employer viewed the men as "tools" by not providing proper health and safety.
As a medical practitioner, occupational specialist, and educator, Dr. Cherniack offers a clear diagnosis of the workplace hazards and conditions that tragically took the men's lives. He tells a compelling story for us to learn from to prevent a reoccurrence of the tragic event.
The Hawk's Nest Incident is a must read story that society must understand, investigate, and learn from for work place safety improvement. Workers must have effective safety and health protocol for prevention of workplace accidents, injuries, death.
Listen to Dr. Cherniack's analysis of the tragic event, because safety is the only metric for workplace protection.