All in a day’s work

When Joe Bateman, Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) safety outreach director, arrives at an ISRI member’s facility for a tailored two-day training session focused mostly on safety, he snaps photos of what he sees.

From workers manning machines to equipment sitting idle, Bateman says he ensures he observes it all.

After spending that first day walking the yard and familiarizing himself with workers and the site, Bateman then hosts 10-hour training classes over the next two days to educate workers on a range of topics, from the basics of Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standards to back injuries. During these training sessions, workers learn that Bateman has incorporated actual photos of the company’s operations into his PowerPoint presentation. Doing this helps to really drive home whether companies are practicing what they preach, he says.

“I use pictures of their people and their equipment [because] pictures don’t lie,” Bateman says.

Until recently ISRI offered a free OSHA 10-hour Training, a two-day program certified by OSHA that addressed a range of issues affecting the recycling industry. ISRI says recent changes OSHA made to mandatory elements of the program prompted ISRI to move away from the OSHA branded training program, opting instead to offer its own customized 10-hour program. This change allows ISRI Safety to more effectively tailor two-day training sessions to the specific needs of individual members, the Washington-based association says.
 

Train the trainer

As of October Bateman says he is booked until February for his on-site safety program assessments. He notes this is one of a number of resources ISRI offers to help recyclers do their jobs safely.

When it comes to proper procedures for moving material, ISRI offers a material handler training course free to its members, Bateman says. The Material Handler Train-the-Trainer program is a two-day course that includes one day in the classroom covering equipment-related safety information and four to six hours in the field going over equipment inspections, blind spot drills, machine setup and control and loading and unloading exercises.

Additional resources and training videos created by ISRI are available at www.ISRISafety.org.

Anywhere Bateman presents training information, he says he is sure to share a training website from equipment supplier Caterpillar, Peoria, Illinois. Available at https://safety.cat.com, Caterpillar’s Safety Services website covers everything from maintaining a safety culture to general equipment safety.

“A skid steer is pretty much a skid steer, and a forklift is pretty much a forklift, so this is a resource I show everywhere I go,” Bateman says of Caterpillar’s dedicated safety page. “There are great training resources here, so people don’t have to reinvent the wheel.”

In addition to online resources, printed manuals and on-site visits from professionals, Bateman says it is “absolutely vital that we look out for one another.” He describes how relationships among coworkers should offer companionship and support in day-to-day operations. This will result in fewer accidents and injuries.

He adds, “I’ve been to over 300 recycling operations, and the operations with the best safety performances are the ones where the people look out for one another.”
 

Enforcing experience

The No. 1 cause of fatalities in the recycling industry for two years straight has been being crushed or run over by a piece of mobile equipment, Bateman says.

Two forklift operators in the recycling industry died last year when they attempted to jump from their tipping forklifts onto the ground. They both were crushed by their machines.

“It never works,” Bateman says of jumping out of moving equipment.

Instead, when moving material using a forklift or similar equipment, workers should always wear their seat belts, he states. It may sound obvious, but it’s a rule that is frequently broken.

“The seat belt helps us to ride a tipping piece of equipment down to the ground, and that’s always best,” Bateman says. “The use of seat belts should be enforced in every operation.”

To stay on top of these rules, every three years forklift operators are required to complete specific certification requirements, called the Powered Industrial Truck Standard, through OSHA.

Operators who are moving material also need to be constantly aware of the yard’s traffic flow. As companies acquire new equipment, erect new buildings and hire new workers, traffic patterns have the potential to change. Each yard should designate “no-go” or “no pedestrian” zones to limit the crossing of motorized traffic and foot traffic, Bateman explains.

Bateman points to an OSHA inspection list, which shows citations the agency made in recycling operations from October 2013 to September 2014. The OSHA standard cited the most in the industry was improper training of forklift operators.

OSHA conducted 63 inspections of forklift operators in the industry and issued 88 citations for a total of $105,459 in penalty fees. Total industry penalties levied by OSHA equaled $1.3 million.

Bateman says he typically leads his training discussions with this information because it “generates a lot of conversation” and leads into the importance of doing the job correctly.

“A lot of people don’t know the rules. It’s just simply ignorance of the law … so we will inform them,” he says.
 

Stacking safety

Additional training for material handler operators is necessary as ISRI’s membership has broadened. While ISRI members have traditionally been iron and steel recyclers, Bateman says, today the association’s membership also includes recyclers of tires, plastics, electronics and paper.

“With electronics, there’s more manual handling, whereas if I’m recycling aluminum siding, the bulk of the work is done with machines,” Bateman says. “There’s very intensive manual handling on the single-stream side of recycling,” he says in regard to material recovery facilities (MRFs).

One of the biggest concerns with bale handling involves stacking. As bales have been known to come apart—material shifts and “is always trying to go back to its original shape,” Bateman says, or straps and wires break.

It’s important to be aware of fallen bales, he says. “It is common for a recycler to come back over the weekend and find an open bale,” Bateman adds.

He suggests stacking three bales high, at most, to avoid injuries.

Three years ago in a warehouse that handles nonferrous metals, a worker sweeping the ground was killed when a stack of bales fell onto her, Bateman says. He describes how a similar incident happened two years ago when a forklift operator was stacking bales. He stepped off of his machine, and the just-placed bale fell on top of him.

“The proper stacking of bales is a very critical safety component in our industry,” Bateman says.

He also warns about issues related to stacking Gaylord boxes, which sit on wooden pallets. Therefore, ensuring the pallet is in good shape, not broken or rotten, is vital, Bateman says.

Additionally, heavy materials should sit on the bottom, while lighter items can be stacked on top.

As moving material and loading rail cars, trucks and shipping containers are daily tasks at recycling companies ranging from scrap yards to material recovery facilities, ensuring proper procedures for material handling are adhered to will prove necessary to ensure safe operations.

The author is associate editor of Recycling Today and can be contacted via email at mworkman@gie.net.