When the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 was passed, Congress created the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. It is this administration that helps to ensure that workers have a workplace that is safe and healthful. They set and enforce standards of safety as well as provide training, outreach, education, and assistance. When a workplace is found to be in violation of the safety standards set by OSHA, the workplace is fined for the violation and given a chance to fix it. Further and repeat violations can result in larger fines and in some cases, cause workplaces to be shut down.
The Macon Telegraph reports that a construction worker has died a week after he fell from a bridge he was working to construct.
45-year-old Jason Searcy, who was an employee for C.W. Matthews Contracting Co., was working on the bridge when he fell. The accident happened at about 1 p.m. on Friday, September 6th. A coworker told deputies who responded to the scene that Searcy was carrying a piece of wood when a piece of metal decking he was walking on fell away.
Searcy died in the surgical trauma intensive care unit at Medical Center Navicent Health.
This is not the first C.W. Matthews employee died working on Georgia roads. Last February, a 42-year-old employee was working in a work zone on Interstate 85 northbound in Suwannee. A motorist drove into the work zone and hit him with a car.
In October of 2016, another C.W. Matthews employee died while working on King Bridge Road in Williamson. He was killed when a truck delivering asphalt bumped him, causing him to fall beneath a paver.
An OSHA investigation found several violations in March 2016, fining the company $21,000.
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