RBDT Inc.: OSHA inspections and violations

Incident on Mar 18, 2021: Employee's fingertip is pinned when heavy pallet is set down

At 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 18, 2021, an employee was working for a new and used car dealership. An automotive or truck transmission was being delivered by truck to the dealership. Along with three coworkers and the parts department manager, the employee was taking the transmission from the delivery truck. The transmission was on a pallet. The truck did not have anything such as a liftgate that could lower the transmission and pallet off the truck. Accordingly, the parts manager made the decision to lift the transmission and remove it from the truck by hand. As the five workers were lifting the pallet, the transmission slid. The five workers quickly set the pallet back down on the truck. One of the employee's fingers became trapped between the truck and the pallet. The employee was taken to the hospital by a coworker using the employee's or coworker's car. The employee received stitches to his fingertip. The employee was treated without hospitalization. The fingertip later had to be surgically amputated. The bone and most of the skin on the employee's fingertip were already detached. That surgery did require inpatient hospitalization. The incident occurred outdoors on a rainy day, so weather was likely a factor. Upon learning that the employee had gone to the hospital, the parts manager, the one helping unload the transmission, submitted an injury report to the dealership on the next day, March 19, 2021. The dealership did not record the recordable injury in the OSHA 300 logs within seven days of first learning about the incident. The recordable injury was entered into the 300 logs 32 days after the employer learned of the incident. The dealership did not report the amputation of the employee's finger as a result of a work-related incident to OSHA within 24 hours after first learning of the amputation. Instead, the employer reported the amputation approximately three months after first learning about the inpatient hospitalization, on or about July 14, 2021.