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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Remind Workers of Their Rights

Some workplaces are more dangerous than others are. In any workplace, there is a risk of injury or death. Workplace accidents can cause injuries ranging from cuts and broken bones to vision or hearing loss, loss of a limb, paralysis, and even death. Some workplace injuries, like respiratory difficulties or carpal tunnel syndrome, can happen after long term exposure or repetitive work. Fortunately, many workplace accidents are preventable. Proper training of employees and safe work habits can go a long way towards preventing accidents at work. However, even careful workers in safety-conscious workplaces can be hurt or killed on the job. If you are injured or if someone you love dies in a workplace accident, you have important rights that are protected by law. 

Shock and disbelief often follow a workplace injury or death. Whether you are the injured person, or someone in your household was hurt or killed at work, you may feel confused, in addition to the grief, hurt, and anger that you feel in connection with your injury or the injury or loss of your loved one.

Compensation for a work-related injury or death cannot restore your health, heal your family member, or account for the loss that you have experienced. However, it can help you and your family pay the medical bills associated with your injury or your family’s loss and possibly even replace some or all of the wages lost because of the accident. Injured individuals and their families could receive compensation for pain and suffering, disabilities, loss of earning capacity, and loss of quality of life, in addition to lost wages and medical bills. Most people who are injured at work or who lose a family member in a workplace accident can receive compensation. A workplace accident attorney can help you determine whether you can file a claim for compensation. They can also help you determine the potential value of your claim and assist you in deciding whether to accept or reject any possible settlement offers you receive.

It is critical that you not attempt to pursue compensation for your injury or loss on your own. There are multiple types of workplace accident claims, and you must file the correct type of claim within the proper amount of time to be eligible for compensation. For example, injuries caused by coworkers or supervisors and many injuries caused by items in your work environment give rise to workers’ compensation claims. However, in some instances, a third-party claim for compensation may be the more appropriate type of claim to file. For example, if your injury or your family’s loss was caused by someone who does not work at your workplace, such as a subcontractor or a service provider, your workplace accident attorney may choose to file a third-party claim.

If you were injured at work, or if a family member died in a workplace accident, do not attempt to file a workplace injury claim alone. A Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys can walk with you through the process of evaluating your workplace injury or loss claim and pursuing compensation. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Talk About Heat-Related Workplace Injuries

The cold days of winter are mostly behind us, and warmer weather brings with it many different types of outdoor work. Working outdoors in the springtime can be enjoyable. Still, as summer draws near and heat and humidity levels rise, the risk of heat-related on the job illnesses and injuries increases.

The types of outdoor work available in Mississippi range from agriculture to construction, landscaping, paving, and so much more. If your work brings you outside into the summer heat, you are at risk for heat-related injuries and illnesses. Heat exposure causes more deaths per year than any other type of environmental exposure. Learning about heat-related illnesses and injuries can help you stay safe when the temperature rises in your outdoor workplace.

Heat-related illnesses occur when a person is exposed to high temperatures, and their body temperature rises faster than their body can accommodate through its natural cooling mechanisms like perspiration. If you are working in a hot place, watch out for nausea, dizziness, fatigue, muscle cramps, or fainting, as these are signs of heat-related illness.

Heat exposure illness and heat exhaustion can progress into heat stroke if the body temperature rises above one hundred and three degrees. Severe headaches, confusion, dizziness, and a rapid pulse are signs of heatstroke. An individual who has heatstroke may even become unconscious. Heatstroke requires immediate medical attention, as brain damage, organ failure, and even death can result from having a body temperature of over one hundred and three degrees for a prolonged time.

Sun exposure can add sunburn and sun poisoning to the list of work-related illnesses and injuries that can happen to workers who work outdoors in hot weather. If you work outdoors in the heat, you must have access to shade, and your employer must provide you with opportunities to get out of the sun. Dehydration is also a common heat-related illness that can happen to individuals who work outdoors in hot weather. Dehydration happens when your body sweats out more water than it takes in. Fatigue, headaches, and lightheadedness are some of the symptoms of dehydration.

Fortunately, there are things that workers and employers can do to reduce the likelihood of a heat-related illness, injury, or heat stroke. Hydration is critical in hot weather, and employers must not only ensure that adequate water is available to their employees, but that workers are encouraged to take time to drink water throughout their workday. Some people may not be aware of how much more water people need when they are working outdoors on a hot day. For example, eight, eight-ounce glasses of water each day is enough to maintain proper hydration for most people hydrated most of the time. If you work outdoors in the heat, you’ll need to drink four, eight-ounce glasses of water every hour!

Workers who plan to be outdoors this summer can do so confidently, knowing that sticking to the recommendations for hydrating and spending time in the shade can prevent many cases of heat-related illness or injury. If you do start to feel sick while you are on the job, tell someone right away. Move to a shaded place or an air-conditioned area, drink water, and seek medical attention if your symptoms do not improve.

If you have been hurt at work, you and your family do not need to file a workplace injury claim alone. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Discuss Traumatic Brain Injuries

Traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) can change lives in an instant. If you are in a workplace accident and you suffer a bump or blow to the head or any other type of head injury, it is critical that you seek medical attention immediately. Head injuries of all kinds are incredibly dangerous, and prompt treatment increases the chance of survival and the chance of recovery. If you suffer a head injury or if you witness an accident where someone receives a head injury, do not delay in seeking medical care or in calling for help for the accident victim. Head injuries do not always produce immediate pain or other symptoms, and dangerous, potentially deadly injuries like bleeding of the brain may not be visible to the eye.

Traumatic brain injuries disrupt the normal function of the brain. The impact of TBIs ranges from mild to severe, and they affect the way the injured person thinks, feels, acts, and moves. Traumatic brain injuries are a frequent cause sof disability and death in America. While automobile accidents are the most frequent cause of traumatic brain injuries, they can happen on the job, whether you are riding in a vehicle or not. For example, in any workplace where there is a fall hazard or the danger of being struck by an object, there is the risk of traumatic brain injury should you fall and hit your head or be struck int eh head by an object.

There are many types of head injuries, including skull fractures, concussions, contusions, and intracranial hematomas. Prompt medical attention after a head injury is the best way to obtain an accurate diagnosis and begin treatment as soon as possible. Treatment for traumatic brain injuries often starts at a hospital or trauma center and then progresses to a rehabilitation facility that specializes in helping patients recover from TBIs. As rehabilitation progresses, TBI patients may be able to work with their treatment providers and employers to make a plan to return for work. In some cases, a job change may be necessary, and additional training and support may become part of the patient’s rehabilitation plan.

Traumatic brain injuries can vary significantly in the amount of recovery time required to resume many activities, including work. The highly complex nature of the brain and the ways that brain injuries affect the victim’s entire being can make it difficult for care providers to assess a patient’s progress through recovery. It also makes it difficult for care providers to develop reliable timelines for when a patient might be able to resume things like walking, talking, writing, driving, and so on.

Traumatic brain injury workplace accident cases can lead to complicated worker’s compensation claims. You and your family do not need to face the challenge of filing a workplace injury claim alone. A workplace accident attorney can help you and your family navigate your workplace accident claim while you focus on your recovery. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Reveal the Six Most Dangerous Jobs In America

In a previous article, we began our review of the ten most dangerous jobs in America, based on 2018 statistics from the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics. We resume our exploration of that list, along with the reasons those jobs are so dangerous, with the sixth most dangerous job in America.

Sales workers and truck drivers have the sixth most dangerous job in America. The primary cause of work-related injuries and death for these workers is transportation, which makes sense considering the many hours they log behind the wheel. Sales workers travel routes throughout their workday, and truckers make pickups and deliveries on local and long-distance routes.

People who work as trash collectors and those who pick up your recyclables hold the fifth most dangerous job in America. Transportation accidents cause the most injuries and fatalities for these workers, who spend their days driving and riding on trucks in all kinds of weather.

The fourth most dangerous job in America belongs to the roofers. Trips, slips, and falls are the most common cause of injury and death among these workers. That is not surprising, because roofing work often happens at heights where a slip or a fall could be deadly. Those of us who do not do roofing work may not realize how physically demanding roofing work is. The job involves a great deal of heavy lifting and climbing, and work takes place in all kinds of weather, including the heat of summer and the chill of winter.

Aircraft engineers and pilots have the third most dangerous job in America. This may be surprising, considering that the number of large, commercial aviation airplane crashes is relatively low. However, the majority of workplace injuries and fatalities in the aviation industry involve aircraft in the private sector.

Fishing is dangerous work, earning it the number two spot on the list of America’s ten most dangerous jobs. The primary cause of workplace injury and death among fishing industry workers is transportation. Transportation in the fishing industry includes time spent on fishing vessels, where fishers spend long hours doing physically demanding work that includes hauling in nets and traps.

The most dangerous job of all belongs to loggers. The logging accidents that claim the most lives and cause the most injuries involve falling objects, which are often the trees that they are attempting to fell. Accidents involving logging equipment, including feller-bunchers, chainsaws, and skidders, are also a top cause of injury and death among loggers.

Whether or not you hold one of the ten most dangerous jobs in America, a workplace accident can keep you off of the job and out of a paycheck for quite some time. If you suffered any type of injury on the job, or you lost a family member in a work-related death, you do not have to navigate the daunting process of filing a workplace injury or death claim alone. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

 

 

 

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Discuss Line Work Accidents

A Florida man died in November when he was electrocuted while working on a power line. Co-workers attempted to perform CPR on the man, and he was transported to a hospital after rescue workers arrived at the accident scene. The man died at the hospital as a result of his injuries.

Line work is one of the ten most dangerous professions. This is not surprising, because line workers work with or near electrical wires, and they often work in rain, snow, and other severe weather to restore service to homes and businesses that have lost power. Even when there are no power outages, line workers are busy installing, repairing, and maintaining the electric and utility lines that bring power, telephone, television, and internet to businesses and homes. Line workers do a diverse assortment of tasks in their work, from trimming trees and setting poles to stringing wires, splicing and soldering cables, replacing worn or damaged components of the electrical and utility distribution systems, and inspecting and testing lines.

For every one hundred thousand people who work on utility lines each year, there are between thirty and fifty fatalities. In addition to workplace fatalities, line workers experience a high risk of on-the-job injuries. Electrocution is an obvious risk of line work. The risk of falls, fires and explosions, musculoskeletal trauma, confined space injuries, and stress-related injuries are also present on line work job sites. Electrical burns and mechanical injuries lead the list of the types of injuries suffered by line workers on the job. Some injured utility workers even lose limbs because of workplace accidents.

Many utility companies acknowledge the high level of risk associated with line work. Still, the injury and fatality rate for the profession is slow to drop despite their increased efforts to improve employee safety. While some companies have improved their employee training programs, others have not, and employees who are not adequately trained to perform this dangerous work pose a danger to others as well as to themselves because line workers work in groups. Sometimes, safety equipment is not maintained in good repair, or line work vehicles are not in good working condition. These issues increase the risk of a line work accident, as does the cumulative stress of working long hours, which often happens for line workers, especially during storms and widespread power outages.

A line work injury can keep you out of work for quite some time. Medical bills can pile up if you have to miss work while you heal, and you may face uncertainty about whether you will recover enough to be able to return to doing line work. If you were injured in a line work accident or if you lost a family member in a line work accident, know that you do not have to navigate the daunting process of filing a workplace injury or death claim alone. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Discuss Workplace Accident Risks for Plumbers

Every job has specific risks associated with it. Plumbing does not make it to the top of lists of the most dangerous jobs, but there are many ways that plumbers can get hurt or even killed at work. An Australian man recently died in the hospital from injuries he received when a pressurized water pipe burst and struck him in the head. The man was working at the iMax theatre construction site at Darling Harbour. This fatal workplace accident is currently being investigated by authorities, who are concerned about several workplace safety concerns that have been reported at the Darling Harbour site. Earlier this year, a Nebraska plumber died when the ceiling of the building where he was working on fixing a leaky pipe collapsed and pinned him under the debris.

Plumbers sometimes have to work on ladders or scaffolding to reach pipes and other equipment that are in high places. There is a risk of falling from a height when a plumber does a job that requires the use of scaffolding or a ladder. Confined space injuries are a job site risk for plumbers, who sometimes must go into pits, ducts, and other places that do not have a safe level of oxygen. Severe injury and death can result when a plumber is unable to breathe or becomes trapped in a confined space like a collapsed trench with no way to escape.

Some of the tools that plumbers use regularly are rather heavy. Pipe wrenches can weigh a lot. When a plumber uses pipe wrenches and other heavy tools frequently, the strain that their body experiences from that work can add up over time to produce repetitive motion injuries like muscle strains, back injuries, or soft tissue damage. There is a great deal of bending, carrying, and lifting, in a plumber’s typical workday, and injuries can result when loads are too heavy, or lifting is done improperly.

Sometimes, plumbers must work in areas where water and electricity are present near each other. That is a dangerous combination and can result in severe or fatal injury from electrocution. Plumbers use torches for soldering, and they can get burned by the torch, hot pipes, and even the solder itself. Soldering and working with plastic and metal pipes involves a range of chemical compounds. Some of the chemicals that plumbers use can cause severe damage if they get into eyes, and could contribute to illness or injury if used over the long term or without proper ventilation. Plumbers also come into contact with sewage regularly. Many serious and potentially fatal diseases can occur as the result of contact with raw sewage or soil that is contaminated with sewage. Hepatitis, E. coli, giardiasis, and encephalitis are just some of the illnesses that plumbers could be exposed to through their work.

If you are a plumber who suffered an injury on the job, call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC today, at 1 (800) 707-9577.

 

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Discuss Workplace Accidents at Wood Pellet Manufacturing Facilities

Wood pellet stoves and boilers are fast becoming a popular way to heat buildings of all kinds. Manufacturing facilities that produce wood pellet fuel make various types of wood pellet fuel and sell it to their customers in bulk or bag it in preparation for sale to consumers through a diverse selection of retail stores. Every workplace, including wood pellet manufacturing facilities, has an array of different injury and accident risks.

A long-time employee of a Mississippi wood pellet plant died in a workplace accident this month. Fifty-five-year-old Johnny Dale Bishop served faithfully as the maintenance manager for years before he died in an early morning accident on October 25. Bishop was working on a burner bin when he fell several feet to the ground. The Monroe County Coroner reports that Mr. Bishop died at the scene of the accident. OSHA and several other authorities are currently investigating the fatal accident.

Wood pellet manufacturing facilities can be dangerous places to work. Proper training and safe work habits can prevent workplace accidents, injuries, and fatalities. Some risks are inherent in the production of wood pellet fuel. One threat to workers at wood pellet plants is the amount of combustible material in their work environment. If a fire or explosion occurs in a pellet manufacturing plant, it can get out of control quickly because of the amount of available fuel. It took firefighters four hours to contain the fire that resulted from an explosion at a Connecticut pellet manufacturing facility in 2013.

The dust produced during the pellet manufacturing process creates a risk of fire and explosion. In 2013, a dust explosion at a New Zealand pellet factory injured an employee. In 2011, a hundred firefighters worked for fourteen hours to put out a fire that started in the dust conveyor system of a pellet plant in New Hampshire.

As evidenced by the aforementioned Mississippi pellet plant fatality, fire and explosion are not the only risks employees of wood pellet manufacturers face during their workday. Falls from equipment and machinery can cause injury or death. The machines used to make and package the pellets can cause crush injuries and other types of injuries or fatalities from employee contact with moving parts. The equipment used to load and move pellets can injure or kill workers.

Wood pellet manufacturing facilities can be dangerous places to work. Unfortunately, so can many other workplaces. A job-related injury can keep you out of work and out of a paycheck for a while as you work through the healing process. Medical bills can pile up if you have to miss work while you pursue the medical care that you need to heal and return for work. The process of filing a workplace injury claim can be daunting, but you don’t have to do it alone. If you were injured at work, call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Discuss Heavy Equipment Accidents

Road construction is dangerous work. Work zone injuries and fatalities have many causes, including distracted drivers, weather, and the machinery and tools that workers use every day. A recent workplace fatality in New Bern, NC is an example of a fatal workplace accident involving road construction machinery.

A man died when a construction roller tipped over. Initial reports of the fatal accident did not state whether the man was operating the roller when it overturned, or whether he was working near the roller when the accident happened. Either scenario could have resulted in a fatal accident. Construction rollers can tip easily, and there are often uneven surfaces in construction areas that can cause them to tip over, crushing the operator and possibly other workers nearby. Also, some rollers have seatbelts and rollover protection devices, but some do not. Even when a roller has seatbelts and other safety equipment, workers sometimes do not use the seatbelts and other safety features, thus increasing their accident risk.

The State Department of Labor is investigating the accident, and other agencies may join in the investigation. When workplace accidents, especially fatalities, are investigated, surprising things often come to light regarding the circumstances surrounding the injury or death that help others understand more about workplace accidents. For example, people who do not work with heavy machinery might think that workers who operate heavy machinery are always qualified to do so and always follow proper safety procedures because their work is so dangerous.

Unfortunately, the operation of heavy machinery is not always carried out with the appropriate degree of care and concern. While not every heavy machinery violation it finds during its workplace inspections leads to an injury or a fatality, many OSHA workplace violations involve heavy machinery. Heavy machinery accidents are one of the top four causes of construction worker deaths, along with falls, electrocution, and getting hit by an object.

Operating heavy machinery is a dangerous job. However, employers and employees can work together to decrease the risk of injury or death in areas where heavy machinery is used. For example, employers can inspect their equipment and maintain it in a safe condition. They can provide personal safety equipment for employees who will be operating the equipment, and they can train their employees on the safe operation of heavy equipment. Employees can also inspect the machinery they are using and alert their employers if it needs repair before it can be operated safely. Employees must use safety equipment that is provided to them, and they must follow the safe operating procedures that they learn while they are receiving the training that enables them to operate heavy machinery.

A workplace accident attorney can help you with the work of pursuing a claim for damages after a heavy machinery workplace accident so that you can focus on healing from your injuries. If your family lost someone in a heavy machinery workplace accident, a workplace accident attorney could take on the task of pursuing a claim for damages while you and your family focus on recovering from your loss. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

 

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Discuss Accidents Involving Military Contractors

The shoddy safety record of one Mississippi shipbuilder is getting a lot of attention lately, as the company continues to get awarded federal contracts over the objections of officials who have asked United States Navy to stop awarding contracts to companies with concerning job safety records. The company, VT Halter Marine Inc. recently got awarded millions of dollars in contracts by the NASA, the Coast Guard, the Navy, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, even though the company got featured on PBS News Hour in February for being the subject of a Reveal investigation. The news story mentioned that the seven private shipbuilders that get contracts from the United States Coast Guard and the United States Navy get billions of dollars in contract work despite safety records that contain serious violations. The violations are so serious that the companies have gotten fined after employees have gotten hurt and, in some cases, killed.

Shipbuilding is dangerous work on its own, but proper work practices and a focus on safety can help companies that build ships do so safely and on a reasonable schedule. The shipbuilding industry just got a boost in the form of a mandate by President Trump to build more ships. Unfortunately, this increase in shipbuilding raises the question of how those ships will get built and how much attention will get given to worker safety in an industry that is already struggling to keep its workers from getting hurt on the job.There is certainly much cause for concern. Navy officials say enforcing workplace safety laws in private shipyards is not their job. Also, in March, Trump signed a resolution into law a resolution that overturned a rule that required companies bidding on large federal contracts to disclose their past safety violations as part of the process.

Unless the Navy actively chooses to stop contracting with businesses that have poor safety records and starts requiring firms to implement better worker safety practices, workers in the American shipbuilding industry could be at even greater risk. It is possible that the increased workloads that follow an award of a contract might cause management to be even more likely to place production as a priority over safety and to push their workers to produce more in less time. That pressure is something which in any work environment creates a safety risk because when employees are under pressure to produce, that’s when they cut corners with following safe work practices and try to work more quickly, increasing the risk of injury or death.

Barrett Law PLLC:  Help for Injured Mississippi Workers and Their Families

Building ships is dangerous work. The injuries and deaths that occur in shipbuilding facilities change the lives of the families and individuals who are affected by them. The workplace injury claims process can be tough to understand, and claims take time and effort to pursue.  A workplace injury attorney can help you with the work of pursuing a claim for damages after a workplace accident so that you can focus on healing from your injuries or your family can focus on recovering from their loss. If you got hurt in a shipbuilding accident or you lost a loved one in a shipbuilding accident, get help from a Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorney. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to learn more.

 

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Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys Talk About Mitigating Workplace Violence Risk

Workplace violence is a real threat to worker safety, but it is much more of a threat at certain types of workplaces than it is at others. Corrections workers face a much higher risk of workplace violence in their work within our nation’s prisons as well as out in the community with those who are involved in the criminal justice system. A recent complaint to the United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regarding a Mississippi prison brought about an investigation and eventual settlement that can serve as a template for requiring employers to actively mitigate the risk of violence within their workplaces.

The complaint got filed in 2011 by a correctional officer who worked at a privately operated state prison in Mississippi. The complaint is eight pages, and it raises numerous questions about the safety of people who work at the prison because of shortages of staff, shortages of security equipment like two-way radios, assaults by inmates on correctional officers, inadequate locking mechanisms on cells, and limited escape routes from the facility.

A shortage of staff in any workplace creates some degree of risk for employees. In a correctional setting, there are many situations where officers should work in pairs to safeguard their safety. When corrections staff work alone there is the potential for violence them more than there is if there are two or more working together. Workplaces of all kinds are responsible for knowing how many employees they need for each shift and for staffing their facilities accordingly. The staffing shortages at the prison were one of the reasons why OSHA cited the facility with a violation of its general duty clause.

Another contributing factor in why OSHA issued a willful violation citation for the prison is that malfunctioning cell door locks were not fixed, which greatly increased the risk of harm to staff and inmates due to violence, even though the employer was aware of the problem and aware of the danger that the problem created for some time. Fortunately, after the prison received the willful violation citation, the company which runs the facility agreed to implement specific safety modifications at the Mississippi prison that was the subject of the complaint and in all of its facilities nationwide. As part of that, the company hired a third-party corrections management consultant and implemented a workplace violence prevention program. They also created workplace safety committees. These steps forward are more than companies usually take after such a citation, but OSHA is hoping that other facilities that got similarly cited will follow suit and take the initiative to improve workplace safety.

Barrett Law PLLC – Representing The Interests of Injured Mississippi Workers

A skilled workplace injury attorney can help you navigate the often tricky task of pursuing a claim for damages after a workplace accident. Your attorney can also offer valuable support and guidance to assist you through every stage of the workers’ compensation claims process. If you got hurt at work or you lost a loved one in a workplace accident, you can get help from a Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorney. Call the Mississippi Workplace Accident Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to find out more.

 

 

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