Module 6 – Impacts of Tragedies and Society
• Brief History of OSH
• Hippocrates (460-377 BC)
• Pliny the Elder (23-70 AD)
• Ulrich Ellenborg (1473)
• A German physician, he recognized the dangers of
metal fumes, described symptoms and preventive
measures.
History of OSH
• Paracelsus (1493-1541)
• Paracelsus is best known today as the
“Father of Toxicology” because of his
observations of dose and response:
“All substances are poisons; there is
none which is not a poison. The right
dose differentiates a poison and a
remedy.”
History of OSH
• Agricoloa (1494-1555)
• He noted the need to provide
ventilation for miners
• “Some mines are so dry that they are entirely
devoid of water and this dryness causes the
workmen even greater harm, for the dust,
which is stirred and beaten up by digging,
penetrates into the windpipe and lungs, and
produces difficulty in breathing and the disease
the Greeks call asthma. If the dust has
corrosive qualities, it eats away the lungs and
implants consumption in the body. In the
Carpathian mountains women are found who
have married seven husbands, all of whom this
terrible consumption has carried off to a
premature death.”
History of OSH
• Bernardino Ramazzini (1633-1714)
• Italian physician, known as the “patron
saint of industrial medicine”.
• His book,The Diseases of Workmen,
described the symptoms of mercury and
lead poisoning and issues with silica
• . Advised physicians to learn about
occupational diseases by studying the
work environment, and exhorted them to
always ask their patients “Of what trade
are you?”
History of OSH
• Sir George Baker (1722-1809)
• Discovered that “Devonshire colic” was caused by
lead contamination in cider.
• Percival Pott (1714-1788)
• A London physician, he was the first to link
occupational exposure to cancer.
• Scrotal cancer among chimney sweeps, caused by soot
• Sir Humphry Davy (1788-1829)
• Investigated problems of mine explosions and
developed the first miner’s safety lamp.
History of OSH
• Dr. Alice Hamilton (1869-1970)
• First woman faculty member at Harvard
University (1919).
• A social activist who worked to improve
occupational health and safety.
• Her autobiography “Exploring the
Dangerous Trades” details her experiences
in the mines and mills across America (for
example, she writes of deplorable
conditions in Salt Lake City area mines).
• http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/hamilton/hamhist.html
Question???
• Why do we think or believe work is not risky (unsafe)?
• Think Sandman
• When do We learn of Occupational Safety Incidents?
US OSH Tragedies and Effects
• 1860 Pemberton Mills - Lawrence MA.
• Mill Collapses 145 Deaths 166 Injured
• 1878 Washburn Mill - Minneapolis MM
• 18 Killed Flour Dust Explosion
• Leveled 7.5 story building
• 1900 – Pleasant Valley Coal Mine
• 200 Workers killed (Black Powder Explosion)
• 1902 Fraterville Coal Mine - Coal Creek TN
• 194 Men and boys - Methane Explosion
Tragedies
• 1907 - Monongah WV – Monongah # 6 and #8
• 362 0f 380 Men and Boys working that day died
• 3200 miners lost their lives of 14,000 Workers in US
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Nq2ryRSdpk
Tragedies
• 1911 - Triangle Shirtwaist
Company
• The Triangle Shirtwaist Company was a
New York City “sweatshop” where
dozens of mostly young female
immigrant workers crowded together to
cut and sew shirtwaists
• http://video.pbs.org/video/1817898383/\
Tragedies
• Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
• The tragedy led to 36 laws reforming the
state labor code
• http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/legacy/ind
ex.html
Tragedies
• 1913 Stag Canon Coal Mine – Dawson NM
• 261 out of 284 die in mine, 2 rescue Workers
• Dust Explosion
• 1930s – Hoover Dam – Boulder City NV
• 112 deaths
• 42 died of “pneumonia”
• CO exposure diversion tunnels
• Compared to 11 on Golden Gate Bridge
Construction
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLRCZAXfEa4
Tragedies
• 1927 - 1935 – Hawks Nest
Tunnel Disaster
• America’s worst industrial disaster
• Construction of the Hawks Nest
tunnel near Gauley Bridge, West
Virginia, caused massive
exposures to silica dust
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R
2BaqHo07cQ&feature=related
Tragedies
• At least 476 men died estimates as high as
1500 deaths by silicosis
• Most victims were African-American men given
the undesirable work in the tunnel
• Silica exposures were so high men were dying
from acute silicosis from only two months
exposure
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMmBsXzkj4
I
Tragedies
• 1944 – Port Chicago CA
• 320 killed when 4600 tons of munitions explode
loading a ship.
• 1944 – East Ohio Gas Co. – Cleveland Ohio
• 130 die as result gas exploding in sewers in
residential area
Tragedies
• 1947 – S.S. Grandcamp Texas City TX
• Explosion following fire of Ammonium Nitrate
(fertilizer)
• 581 killed (entire fire department from Texas City)
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TworcINhDhQ
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=V8_Ka
Wg5bI8
Tragedies
• 1965 – Titan II Missile Silo Searcy AK
• Electrical fire and explosion trapped and killed
53 inside silo.
• 1968 - Farmington WV
• 78 miners die coal dust explosion
• 1978 – Willow Island WV
• Coal Power Plant Cooling tower collapses during
construction. 51 Killed
• 1979 – Three Mile Island – Harrisburg PA
• No loss of life?
• Environmental Contamination
Tragedies
• 1984 – Union Carbide Bhopal India
• Methyl Isocynate Gas Leak
• Varying estimates, 3000 killed, other another
11,000 related to gas leak
• 2006 500,000 injuries, 38,000 temporary partial
disability, and 3900 severe permanent disability
Tragedies
• 1984 – Union Carbide Bhopal India
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uz73rcdSG
80 (33:51)
Tragedies
• 1985 – Union Oil – Romeoville IL
• Refinery Explosion
• 17 deaths
• 1988 – Oil Rig Piper Alpha North Sea
• Explosion
• 167 deaths
• 1989 – Phillips Chemical Pasadena TX
• Explosions kills 23 injures 314
Tragedies
• 1991 – Imperial Foods Hamlet NC
• Flash fire
• 25 workers killed 54 injured
Tragedies
• 2005 – British Petroleum, Texas City TX
• Broken Safety Devices
• 15 killed 170 Injured
• http://www.csb.gov/investigations/detail.aspx?
SID=20&Type=2&pg=1&F_InvestigationId=20
• (3:20)
• OSHA issues record breaking fines to BP - $87,430,000
in proposed penalties to BP for the company's failure
to correct potential hazards faced by employees. The
fine is the largest in OSHA's history. The prior largest
total penalty, $21 million, was issued in 2005, also
against BP.
Tragedies
• 2008- Imperial Sugar, Port Wentworth GA
• Combustible Dust Explosion
• 13 killed 30 injured
• http://www.csb.gov/investigations/detail.aspx?
SID=6
Tragedies
• 2010 – BP Deep Water Horizon
• 11 fatalities
• Worst Oil Spill
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=db9T0XYKh
rA&feature=related
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=tXnF
pkJ9au8
Tragedies
• Significance
• Tragedies were important in getting our nation’s
attention, because death on the job as a normal
everyday event
• Example: in a single Pennsylvania county, 524
workers died in one year.
Tragedies
• It took a tragedy to get attention, since death on the
job was a normal every-day event.
Improvements in Workplace Safety — United States, 1900–1999, MMWR,
June 11, 1999 / Vol. 48 / No. 22
Tragedies
• Why do we view occupational incidents resulting in a tragedy
differently?
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Accidents Cheap up until 1900s
• Able to sue employer
• Who received compensation
• Average award
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Progressive Era
• What was it?
• Reforms to keep up with progress (Modernization)
• “Progressive Era” of the1890s through the 1920s.
• OSH reforms
• Muckrakers
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2ppaJwQ9UM&fe
ature=related
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Organized Labor
• Labor unions
• For example, the International Ladies Garment
Workers Union (ILGWU), established 1900, pushed
for comprehensive safety and workers’
compensation laws
• http://www.history.com/videos/history-of-laborday#the-fight-to-end-child-labor
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Worker’s Compensation
• What is it?
• Protections Afforded - Exclusivity
• Worker
• Employer
Social Changes and other
Factors
• 1914 - Studies in New York City and
Youngstown, Ohio
• Revealed unsanitary conditions and tuberculosis
among workers, leading to the abolishment of
“sweat shops.”
• 1923 - Studies of the “dusty trades”
• Led to the development of industrial hygiene
sampling equipment.
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Professional organizations
• American Society of Safety Engineers, 1911
• National Safety Council, 1913
• American Industrial Hygiene Association, 1939
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Economic factors
• The Great Depression, 1929 through the 1930s
• Government established labor standards and encouraged
unions through President Roosevelt's “New Deal”
• World War II
• Ended the Great Depression and started a period of industrial
growth
• Some gains of recent years were lost due to the need to
maximize wartime production
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Environmental and social activism of the
1960s and 1970s
• Laws protecting workers as well as the
environment were passed during this socially
active period
• http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4897690520976827985
Social Changes and other
Factors
• Are we there yet??
• Or have we changed location??
• http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/25/100_years_after_t
riangle_fire_tragedy