An Ohio foundry was once again cited by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), this most recent visit being the fifth time the administration has gone to the site because of a worker’s serious injury.

The General Aluminum Mfg. Company’s Conneaut, OH facility has been visited by OSHA because of serious injuries in the past, and the most recent injury involved a man whose left hand was crushed by a mold-tilting machine. He has still not been able to return to work and has limited use of his hand. Four workers at this site and other sites owned by the company have also been subject to amputations in the past because of safety violations. The company has disputed citations that resulted from two of those four incidents.

The company received two repeat and two serious violations, with fines totaling $218,244. One serious violation was for failing to implement procedures to lockout equipment (shut off power to the machines) so that they did not start up unexpectedly during training or maintenance. This worker was training another worker on procedures when the machine started up.  They received a repeat violation related to this as well, for failing to make sure that all steps for securing or blocking energy were identified on the lockout procedures for machines. They also received a repeat violation for failing to inspect the lockout procedures annually to make sure proper procedures were being followed and all of the sources of energy were identified to employees.

View OSHA’s press release and the complete list of citations here.