UA Safe State participated in the H2OSHA outreach campaign hosted by the U.S. Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s Birmingham Regional Office for Heat Awareness Week from June 24-26. The outreach campaign sought to teach employers how to protect their workers from heat-related illnesses.
Throughout the week, OSHA’s regional team engaged with local businesses, generating awareness of the resources and publications OSHA provides to assist employers with navigating safety protocols for heat exposure. Resources shared with businesses included a copy of OSHA’s “Prevent Heat Illness at Work” brochure and information regarding its Heat Safety Tool, “an app that allows workers and supervisors to calculate the heat index for their worksite” and receive a risk level for outdoor workers based on the index.
“People need to better understand the serious risks of high heat coupled with high humidity and a lack of fluid replacement,” said Matt Hollub, director of Safe State OSHA consulting services. “This special effort by the OSHA Birmingham Regional Office to raise employer-worker awareness of these issues is a project we fully support through our ongoing consultation and outreach.” The consultation program is a federal-state cooperative agreement between OSHA and The University of Alabama College of Engineering. The OSHA Birmingham Regional Office serves Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee.
In support of the campaign, Hollub and his team of OSHA consultants carried out a multifaceted outreach project, including making visits to construction sites, warehouses, foundries, landscapers, and baking and dry cleaning facilities.
“Our on-site visits engaged with employers and their workers on preventing heat illness, and how to recognize and respond to cases of heat exposure,” said Hollub. “We routinely address heat hazards as part of our ongoing no-cost consultation service to help employers with planning, including providing them with environmental and personal monitoring.”
UA Safe State’s campaign also included three construction training events. In total, their efforts reached over 1,000 workers and they distributed more than 500 brochures. Additionally, Randy Easterling, the safety program supervisor for the Safe State OSHA consultation program, hosted a live Heat Hazards virtual seminar with over 75 attendees. Easterling discussed how extreme heat affects workers, best practices for heat safety and the importance of developing heat management plans.
UA Safe State is a consultative service provided by The University of Alabama to employees throughout the state. The program is intended to assist employers in controlling costs by decreasing accidents, illnesses and problems with regulatory compliance. The program’s outreach efforts include conference presentations, training, consultations, webinars, exposure testing and interactions with at-risk workers. Learn more about Safe State’s consultation services.