New food safety rule, PSM training, workplace stabbing
What’s going on in EHS this week? Find out with Safety at the Frontline!
Tune in on Mondays to get the latest safety news with Frontline’s podcast. We’re covering the top EHS news, along with some quick and useful tips, so you can stay safe and keep rocking on the frontlines.
New food traceability rule
A strict new food traceability rule is set to become official on November 7th, according to the FDA. To make foods safer, the new rule requires a detailed account of food origins and movements throughout production, processing, and shipping, even as these foods are transformed into other food products, or as other foods are added to them.
Food Safety News explains that “when a whole salmon becomes filets and then salmon cakes; each part of the process will need to trace back to the fish and the boat it came from. Similarly, when fresh fruit is sold to a company that makes fruit salad, the salads will have to be traced back to the grower, with every transfer recorded.
CSB launches PSM training
On to the next news, the Chemical Safety Board is launching an interactive Process Safety Management training based on the Texas City disaster in 2005.
The recently released interactive training from the CSB includes agency findings on the deadly refinery explosion. This case study will help form guidelines for managing hazardous chemicals and complying with OSHA’s standard on process safety management.
The explosion, which occurred in March 2005 at a BP refinery in Texas City, TX, killed 15 people and injured 180 others.
Since releasing its final report on the incident in 2007, CSB has produced several safety videos on the subject. In March 2020, the agency announced its intent to develop training that used the explosion as an example and included the 14 elements of the standard on process safety management of highly hazardous chemicals.
CSB on transparency
Last news of the week, a company in Baton Rouge is being cited for not protecting employees from violence after the stabbing of an employee. An assistant manager of a “car wash, oil change, fueling, and convenience store” was said to be working behind the counter with other employees when someone walked in. The assistant manager was then stabbed “multiple times” and transferred to a hospital. Thankfully, they were later sent home.
After investigating the incident, OSHA found that this was not the first violence-related incident in the store. They were cited for not protecting workers from violence and not reporting the hospitalization in time by law and were proposed $17,403 in penalties.
