Company sued over lack of adequate ventilation for hazardous welding job

“We need to talk,” said Ralph, the plant manager.

“What’s going on?” asked Alice, the supervisor.

“We just got slapped with a lawsuit from Matthew, that contract worker who suffered a severe lung injury when he was exposed to hazardous welding fumes.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember that,” said Alice. “It was an unfortunate incident.”

“Matthew thinks the incident was more than unfortunate,” said Ralph. “He contends that our negligence caused his debilitating injury.”

“How were we allegedly negligent?” asked Alice.

“As you know,” said Ralph, “Matthew was working in a hallway fixing lights when he noticed fumes coming from a nearby work area. He walked into the room to find out what was going on and saw one of our employees performing hot work. Matthew demanded that the welding work stop right away, and our crew member complied with his request.”

“So what’s the problem?” asked Alice.

“Matthew says the welder wasn’t using local exhaust ventilation to remove hazardous welding fumes, even though regulations mandate the use of local exhaust ventilation during hot work,” said Ralph.

“Yeah, that was a mistake by our crew member,” said Alice. “He later told me that the smoke eater was broken, so he couldn’t use it. Clearly, he shouldn’t have moved forward with the job without that critical piece of safety equipment.”

“It could be a costly mistake,” said Ralph.

“I hope not,” said Alice. “I mean, I don’t understand how we can be held legally responsible when a member of our crew runs afoul of a safety rule and we’re not even aware of the violation.”

“Matthew says we should’ve known about the safety blunder,” said Ralph. “After all, one of our supervisors signed the hot work permit prior to the start of welding work.”

“Keep in mind that Matthew was given an
N-95 respirator before the welding work started,” said Alice, “but he chose not to wear the gear.”

“Matthew says the N-95 respirator wouldn’t have given him adequate protection from the toxic fumes,” said Ralph.

“Some protection is better than no protection,” said Alice. “We should challenge this lawsuit.”

Result: The company lost. The court said the host employer had a legal obligation to make sure the contract crew member wasn’t exposed to hazardous welding fumes.

According to the judge, the welder shouldn’t have proceeded with the job once he found out that the smoke eater wasn’t working properly.

The court noted that the host employer’s supervisor signed the hot work permit prior to the start of the task, so the supervisor should’ve known that the welder wasn’t adhering to safety regulations.

Yes, the injured contract staffer didn’t use the N-95 respirator that had been given to him, but the judge said there was insufficient proof that the mask would’ve protected him from the hazardous welding fumes anyway.

Based on Digangi v. NYU Langone Hospitals.

(From the Dec. 23, 2024, issue of Safety Alert for Supervisors. To start your no-obligation trial subscription to the publication right now, please click here.)