I wouldn’t be surprised to see a pattern of OSHA nannying in which enterprises on the outs with Democrats and liberals are subjected to more scrutiny and/or harassment than those who benefit from Democrat crony capitalism.
...but Illinois Gun Works had not relabeled each Hoppes bottle to list all the hazardous chemicals therein.We used to have CDC (Control Data Corporation) mainframes back in the 1970s along with on-site customer engineers (CE's) to maintain them.
They NEVER give up. We must be EQUALLY relentless in pushing THEM back.
“The employee was not wearing any hand protection such as gloves. The gun range floor was contaminated with lead.”
There is no OSHA regulation about surfaces with lead, only airborne. Yes gloves would be nice, but I bet there were plenty of Wash Your hands signs.
The chemical labeling IS an OSHA standard for the workplace. If you buy a drum of Hoppes and split it up into smaller bottles, you must label each bottle with what the hazards are.
As for noise, it is possible to wear nice new headphones that have a 28 db attenuation rating, and still be overexposed to sound. Some of the electronic ones do not attenuate that much, some are only 20 db. You measure and integrate over a workday, with special tools for impulse noise. There are noise dosimeters that the worker wears, you get the total noise exposure from that, then you consider the personal protective equipment reduction. If the total exposure exceeds the limit with the headphones, it’s a violation.
The author should have looked up some of the regs he’s complaining about.
I went to my shooting range this morning...blew off 15 magazines of 45ACP from my new SR1911. There are 8 more 1911s to go through.
Tomorrow, it’s my M9A1 Beretta, the day after it’s my Remington 1911 R1 and so on.....I’ve got a bunch of older ammo that needs clearing out so I can replenish....
Suck it liberals.
“However, if the heavy fine and the citation against Illinois Gun Works are followed by similar enforcement against other gun ranges, there may be many fewer ranges soon.”
You may rest assured, that if the NRA doesn’t challenge these bastards and win in the Courts, it WILL be used as a template for future pursecution.
A win, actually, isn’t enough. OSHA should be hit with a harassment suit for trying to interfere with a constitutional right.
My ex wife thought my Hoppe’s #9 was aftershave for years.
http://www.hoppes.com/msds/Hoppes9/MSDS_Tri-Pac_No_%209_Solvent-Liquid_Revision_1-3.pdf
At a minimum, you need the NFPA diamond symbol on each bottle, along with the name of the chemical and most hazardous materials.
Just because it’s a range does not make it less of a workplace.
BTW I remember when Hoppes had nitrobenzene as one of the solvents. Wow would it get powder residue, and it smelled great too. A bit more flammable and toxic, but what’s that next to a clean barrel?
I would bet that OSHA does not outline exactly what is required for compliance.
According to Eric Conn of Washington, D.C., head of the OSHA Practice Group at Epstein Becker & Green, a national labor and employment, and health care law firm.
Obama’s administration changed the enforcement emphasis from the get-go, Conn says. He initially brought in a new Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, who brought in a team that believes enforcement changes the way companies do business.
The agency seems to embrace a policy of “shaming” and “embarrassing” companies they find out of compliance, Conn says. When the agency issues press releases to notify the public about citations, Conn says he’s never seen a public retraction if the citation is successfully challenged. “They’re using really ridiculous, scathing, unfair language like we’ve never seen before.”
Once again, a bureaucratic agency making up stuff as they go along...pulling stuff out of their azz. Small businesses do not have the deep pockets to fight these scum.
Every OSHA inspection I've been party to was called by a disgruntled employee to knock the employer upside the head. If you can guess what it costs to have the Federal worker come to your place of business and do an inspection, that is approximately what your fine will be. They just look for enough minor stuff to run the total to at least that.
Any major fines can be negotiated down once you show compliance or that you have your "mind right".
OSHA can be zeroed out of the Federal budget and worker's safety returned to the states.