OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #800474
LUNG,ASPHYXIATED,SPRAY PAINTING,POISONING,RESPIRATOR
Event description
THREE EMPLOYEES ASPHYXIATED BY PAINT FUMES
Investigation abstract
Employee #1 was in a confined space area, approximately 8 feet wide by 10 feet d m. eep by 7.5 feet long, with an open top. Employee #1 was spraying a mixture of co al tar epoxy paint and methyl ethyl ketone solvent for about 1.5 hours. He appar ently became dizzy and began to climb out of the tank when he either slipped or passed out before he could get out and fell back into the tank. Employee #1 had been using a Willson Series 1200 respirator while painting. When Employee #1 fel l back into the tank, Employee #2 went in to retrieve him without wearing a resp irator, and he also was overcome by the heavy fume concentration. Employee #3 sa w the situation and ran for help. The company had no confined space entry progra
Victims (3)
-
#1 Hospitalized Age 39 M
- Nature of injury
- 2
- Part of body
- 28
- Event type
- 8
- Source
- 9
- Occupation code
- 579
- Human factor
- 6
- Environmental factor
- 7
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#2 Non-hospitalized injury Age 27 M
- Nature of injury
- 2
- Part of body
- 28
- Event type
- 8
- Source
- 9
- Occupation code
- 579
- Human factor
- 6
- Environmental factor
- 7
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#3 Non-hospitalized injury Age 32 M
- Nature of injury
- 2
- Part of body
- 28
- Event type
- 8
- Source
- 9
- Occupation code
- 599
- Human factor
- 6
- Environmental factor
- 7
- Task assigned
- 1
Codes shown verbatim from OSHA's accident-investigation database. A human-readable decoder is coming in a future release once the accident_lookup2 dictionary is loaded.