An Indiana framing contractor working on projects in Perrysburg faces nearly $200,000 in fines after federal workplace safety inspectors found the company exposing its employees to deadly risks of falls twice in less than two weeks in May, the U.S. Department of Labor reported Thursday.
The company, MDM & Sons Construction LLC, faces $199,761 in proposed penalties. It was cited by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for similar violations in 2021, officials said.
“MDM & Sons Construction continues its dangerous pattern of exposing its employees to the risk of serious injuries and death related to falls from elevation, the leading cause of fatalities in the construction industry,” said Todd Jensen, OSHA Area Director in Toledo.
“Federal law requires employers to provide and ensure the use of proper fall protection whenever people work at heights six feet or greater,” Mr. Jensen said. “If MDM & Sons Construction continues to ignore its legal responsibility to protect its workers’ safety, it may only be a matter of time before disaster strikes and an employee’s life is forever changed or ended. The company must act now.”
OSHA issued four citations for willful violation to the Woodburn, Ind.-based company for “again exposing workers to fall hazards, lacking fall protection training, and not developing an accident prevention program” after agency inspectors spotted company employees working on residential roofs at heights up to 13 feet without proper fall protection May 1 on Brampton Park Road and May 14 on Old Dover Road, a news release said.
In addition, OSHA issued citations for six serious violations “for failing to train workers to operate powered industrial trucks safely, exposing employees to ladder and electric hazards, and lacking handrails on stairs.” Inspectors also found the company failed to provide eye protection for workers using pneumatic nail guns, the release said.
Previously, the agency cited the company for two willful and six serious violations after two inspections in 2021. The findings in the May inspections are similar to those in 2021, the agency said.
Based on those findings, the agency placed the company in its severe violator enforcement program, which “concentrates resources on inspecting employers that have demonstrated indifference to their OSH Act obligations by committing willful, repeated, or failure-to-abate violations,” according to the agency’s official website.
Company representatives could not be reached for comment.
A total of 1,056 construction workers died on the job in 2022, with 423 of those fatalities related to falls from elevation, slips or trips, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
MDM & Sons Construction LLC was incorporated in 2020. The business is recorded as a domestic limited liability company. Woodburn is just across the state line from the Paulding County, Ohio community of Antwerp.
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