b.1. Background and Need for Worker Safety, Health and Security Training Hazardous waste clean-up operations expose remediation workers, transportation workers, warehouse workers, rail workers and construction workers to a wide range of safety and health hazards. Workers are especially at risk during excavation, demolition, site waste hauling operations, and warehousing of hazardous materials. Workers in areas where chemical exposures are possible are required to wear chemical protective clothing and respirators. On-site construction workers at hazardous waste clean-up sites face safety hazards typical of construction projects, including working at heights, working in excavations, falling objects, manual materials handling, electrical hazards, etc. Many remediation contractors are construction companies. It is not unusual for a construction site to become a hazardous waste site when contaminants from prior industrial uses or illegal disposal are discovered at the site. Warehouses are used to store a variety of hazardous and combustible materials. The materials stored at warehouses may change from day to day. Warehouse employees are required to move hazardous, combustible, or incompatible materials to trucks for shipment, to other storage sites within the warehouse complex, or to treatment and disposal facilities. Transportation and railroad workers are potentially exposed to the hazardous materials they handle. Railroad workers are exposed to hazardous materials when they move damaged rail cars and repair tracks after an accident involving hazardous materials. Up to 70% of rail workers are potentially exposed to hazardous waste hauled by train (Rosenthal 1999). More than 3 billion tons of regulated hazardous materials, including explosives, poisons, corrosives, flammables and radioactive materials are transported each year. The hazardous materials shipments range in size from several ounces to thousands of tons. There are 1.2 million daily hazardous materials movements via truck, rail, and boat. Many of these shipments require transfer between modes. The shipments are routed through densely populated or sensitive areas where an incident could result in the loss of life, serious injury, or significant environmental damage. (Research and Innovative Technology Administration, 2008). Accidental hazardous materials incidents injure and kill workers, and affect surrounding communities. In 2008, 16,804 transportation hazardous materials incidents were reported to DOT resulting in 202 non-hospitalized injuries,17 hospitalizations, 9 fatalities, and damages totally $55,709,476 (DOT 2008). Examples of hazardous materials transportation emergencies include the following: In July, 2009 a gas tanker overturned on Interstate 95 in Newburyport, MA. One man and a 14-year old boy were critically injured and 3 people were treated at a near-by hospital and released. (Gloucester Daily Times, July 9 2009.) The gas tanker spilled 8,000 gallons of gasoline onto 1-95, forced city government to shut off utilities in the area because of a high vapor reading, and forced the evacuation of near-by neighborhoods. Gasoline from the spill leaked into the storm drains that led into the Merrimack River causing boat traffic to be diverted. In December, 2008 a dike at the TVA Kingston Fossil Plant failed and released 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash over a 300 acre area. It has been estimated that 2.2 million pounds of the ash may contain significant levels of arsenic, lead, barium, chromium and manganese. The clean-up of the Kingston Fossil Plant will require hazardous materials workers to remediate the site and transport ash from the contaminated area to storage, treatment, and disposal sites in Alabama and Georgia. TVA expects remediation and clean-up costs to range from $525 million to $825 million. (TVA Website) In 2004 a chlorine leak from a rail tanker car created a gas plume near San Antonio, TX that killed the conductor and 2 residents. Another 50 people were hospitalized, 2 in critical condition (Seewalt, 2004). As a result of this disaster, 60 police, fire and sheriff's dispatchers participate in NLC's on-line hazardous materials transportation awareness course. On January 6, 2006 a train derailed in Graniteville, SC. The train engineer and 8 residents died from the release of 40 tons of chlorine. Hundreds of citizens suffered various forms of respiratory effects. Everyday exposures that workers face is another reason transportation workers need adequate training. Many of these workers have spent years on the job unaware of the health effects and necessary precautions needed in their daily activities. The following comments from trainees demonstrate the lack of understanding and awareness: ? """"""""When there is an incident on the tracks (a spill) we are always told to just cover it up or ignore it, and I am going to make them to do the right thing."""""""" ? """"""""A chlorine car over turned, nobody knew what to do. Half the people wanted us to go;the other half wanted us to fix it. Training has helped me realize the important thing to do.""""""""
