With drones continuing to soar in popularity, it’s likely that there will be plenty of them under Christmas trees this year, ready to be unwrapped, taken outside and flown. The Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) has created a “Buzzy the Drone” character to teach newbies the do’s and don'ts of being a responsible drone operator and flying their new drone safely.

A 2016 bus crash near Laredo, Texas that killed nine people was caused by the driver’s fatigue and diabetes complications, according to an investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). The May 14 incident occurred at approximately 11:24 a.m., central daylight time, when a 49-passenger motorcoach, operated by OGA Charters LLC of San Juan, Texas, entered a horizontal curve to the right, but drifted from its lane to the left.

OSHA and its Alliance partner, the National Grain and Feed Association (NGFA), in cooperation with the Grain Elevator and Processing Society, will hold Stand-Up for Grain Safety Week, March 25-29, 2019. The event will focus on grain bin entry, machine guarding, respiratory protection, falls, heat, lockout/tagout, and other industry issues.

With the recent focus on robots and worker safety, it may be surprising to learn that the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) first addressed this issue 34 years ago. In 1984, the agency released safety recommendations for working with robots after an experienced operator of an automated die-cast system died when he became pinned between the back end of an industrial robot and a steel safety pole.

Work-related cancers cost between €270 ($343) and €610 ($776) billion a year in the EU-28 (the European Union including the United Kingdom, which is soon to become a non-member), according to a new book from the European Trade Union Institute.

An amputation injury at an ice cream manufacturing facility in Lakewood, New Jersey has earned an employer $103,476 in proposed penalties. The citations issued by OSHA against Mister Cookie Face LLC for machine safety hazards followed an incident in which a sanitation employee suffered a fingertip amputation and a fractured finger when the machine he was attempting to unjam, activated.

A new form of training is aimed at countering physician burnout – a mental health issue which has emerged as a significant problem in the U.S. for both the medical professionals who suffer from it and the patients whose care may be affected by it. Physician burnout may lead to errors in care that can raise the cost of both health care – potentially putting it beyond some patients’ means – and malpractice insurance.

Loren Sweatt, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health, spoke last week at the International Safety Equipment Association Annual Meeting in Alexandra, Virginia.

The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) last week filed a complaint in the United States District Court for Southern District of West Virginia, charging that the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) unlawfully released Pocahontas Coal Company, LLC’s Affinity Mine from MSHA’s Pattern of Violations (POV) status in August.

Excuse the length of this depressing exercise, but I’ve been away for a couple of weeks and unlike me, workplace death takes no vacation. The usual falls, machinery deaths, vehicle accidents. Also several sanitation workers lost their lives over the past several week, as well as retail workers shot on the job.