An Illinois pizza manufacturer is facing $2,812,658 in Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) penalties and has been placed in the agency’s severe violator enforcement program (SVEP) after a 29-year-old sanitation worker died while cleaning a conveyor.
A temporary worker employed by XCEL Staffing Solutions LLC in Waukegan was using compressed air to clean a spiral conveyer as it moved to cool pizza in the Miracapo Pizza Company’s Gurnee sheeting facility. Her head became caught in the machinery. Agency inspectors learned that temporary workers at the facility hadn’t been trained or given the authority to stop equipment from moving before cleaning.
The worker was under the supervision of Miracapo at the time of her fatal injury.
Miracapo Pizza of Elk Grove Village was cited for 16 willful serious violations, 1 willful violation, and 12 serious violations, including 5 serious instance-by-instance violations. Agency inspectors may issue instance-by-instance citations for violations of certain standards under an enforcement guidance issued January 26.
Instance-by-instance citations may be issued for “high-gravity” serious violations of the lockout/tagout (control of hazardous energy) standard, as well as violations of the fall protection, machine guarding, permit-required confined space, respiratory protection, and trenching standards.
Employers in the agency’s SVEP are subject to mandatory follow-up inspections.
The fatality at the Gurnee sheeting facility occurred just weeks after an incident at the same facility in which a worker performing maintenance on a sauce depositor suffered an amputation, which led OSHA to assess Miracapo $290,191 in proposed penalties. In October 2021, another employee suffered the amputation of a fingertip while trying to clear a jammed pizza conveyor, according to the agency.
“This tragedy took the life of a young woman, and forever changes the lives of her family, friends, and co-workers. Safety standards are put in place to prevent these kinds of tragedies,” Doug Parker, assistant secretary of labor for occupational safety and health, said in an agency statement. “Employers have a responsibility to train workers in the language they understand so they know how to perform their work safely.”
Specific failures and hazards identified by agency inspectors included the following:
- Deficient lockout/tagout procedures to isolate energy during service and maintenance. The company failed to establish and use proper procedures for controlling hazardous energy, provide locks to employees, and train employees in a language they understood on how to lock out equipment such as dough mixers, ovens, sauce depositors, toppings, and crust spiral devices.
- A lack of adequate machine guards on dough mixers and sprocket wheels and chains.
- Exposing employees working on dough mixers and an oven to fall hazards.
- Exposing workers to the risk of electrical hazards.
- Not ensuring adequate use of electrical personal protective equipment.
- Failing to provide appropriate eye protection, exposing workers to the potential for eye injuries.
“Our investigations at Miracapo Pizza Company show why OSHA’s regional emphasis program for the food manufacturing industry is so important, especially as we continue to find third-shift sanitation workers suffering injuries,” Bill Donovan, OSHA’s Chicago regional administrator, said. OSHA inspectors have investigated multiple fatalities, dozens of amputations, fractures, and workers with crushed hands or fingers in the Midwest, finding lockout/tagout or machine guarding violations at food manufacturing facilities.