The world’s leading authority on leaks, drips and spills, located in Tipton, Pennsylvania, has a very peculiar name: New Pig. Still, it has information that is extremely relevant to the topic of personal injury, having recently released its current Walk Zone Safety Report. The report provides a comprehensive look at same-level slips, trips, and falls in workplaces and public facilities based on information gathered from surveys of professionals in multiple industries.
The data has been culled from those who work in the fields of maintenance, safety, health risk, and facilities management. Basically, what it shows is that many of the slip and fall incidents that occur at the workplace have been due to negligence. Many work settings are, in fact, accidents waiting to happen.
If you have suffered a slip and fall accident at your own workplace, or at another place of employment, such as a supermarket, department store, or office building, as soon as your urgent medical needs are attended to you should contact a knowledgeable, aggressive personal injury attorney like Lou Lombardi, who is well-known for both his track record of success and its compassion. The law firm of Louis P. Lombardi II & Associates, P.C., serves clients in Montgomery and Bucks Counties and throughout the Philadelphia area.
What the New Pig Safety Report Shows
The New Pig survey shows that far too many hazards and risk zones are overlooked at the workplace and are, therefore, the cause of far too many slips, trips and falls. In spite of professionals tasked with examining walk zones and pinpointing areas of high risk, New Pig discovered that organizations often remain unaware of high-risk walk zones in their buildings, and, even when informed about such risks, routinely underestimate them.
This negligence, in addition to exposing employees and visitors to imminent danger, exposes the companies themselves to significant liability through workers’ compensation, and, in particularly egregious cases, to private lawsuits. Having in-house accidents on their records may also lead to low morale among employees, productivity losses, and damage to their brand and/or personal reputation. Depending on the circumstances, they may even be subjected to lawsuits involving permanent disability, wrongful death, and/or punitive damages.
Statistics on Slip, Trip, and Fall Accidents
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, same-level slip and fall accidents are the leading cause of workplace injuries, totaling nearly 200,000 in 2015. Moreover, the 2017 Liberty Mutual Workplace Safety Index reports that these types of falls resulted in almost $11 billion in workers' compensation and medical costs during the last year. It should be noted that these accidents have taken place in spite of the new OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) standards for walking-working surfaces in commercial spaces.
What makes “hazardous walk zones” so hazardous?
In many cases, slip and fall accidents could have been easily avoided by:
- The placement of non-slip floor mats throughout walkways, not just at entry ways
- The replacement of worn, wrinkled, bunched, curled or shifting floor mats
- Super vigilance and cleaning of entry ways during rainy, snowy, or icy weather
One major problem seems to be the disconnect between the perception of danger by business owners, managers, and employees and the actual risks at the site. Clearly, the number of risk zones in almost any commercial building is underestimated. For example, while 46 percent of respondents point out under three risk areas in their building, the survey showed evidence of more than 10 different locations as “common fall” locations. Also, only about half of New Pig’s respondents were unaware of the newly released OSHA Walking-Working Surfaces rule -- which took effect this past January 2017 -- and of those who were aware of the new regulations, only 29 percent complied with them.
The majority of businesses have mats at their entrance ways, but none to cover the other nine areas designated as dangerous. This remains the case even though nearly one in four of personal injuries occurred outside of the entrance area -- in areas around equipment or machines, walkways and aisles, transition areas, and kitchens.
What Businesses Should Do
The New Pig report has serious implications for businesses throughout the country. In order to establish and maintain safety in all parts of their buildings, as well as to come into compliance with new OSHA standards, it is vital that those in charge of these businesses perform comprehensive checks of their premises, preferably with a professional who is familiar with risk evaluation in tow. If you have worries concerning the safety of your own workplace floor, you should report them to management promptly.
What You Should Do If You Are Injured on the Job
If you have the misfortune to suffer a trip or slip and fall accident on the job in Philadelphia or the surrounding area of Montgomery or Bucks Counties, please don’t hesitate to contact the law firm of Louis P. Lombardi II & Associates, P.C. We are here to make sure that you and your family are well taken care of, and receive the full workers’ compensation you deserve. In addition, if someone other than your employer is liable for maintaining the premises, we may be able to file a lawsuit on your behalf for additional damages.