Health Hazard Evaluation Report: HETA 2000-0262-2833: Southern Supply & Manufacturing Company, Inc., St. Petersburg, Florida

Details

• Personal Author:
  Harney, Joshua M. ; Trout, Douglas B.
• Corporate Authors:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Description:
  In April 2000, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) received a management request for a Health Hazard Evaluation (HHE) at the Southern Supply & Manufacturing Company, Inc. in St. Petersburg, Florida. Southern Supply & Manufacturing Co., Inc. manufactures shears, scissors, and thread nippers for the garment, textile, and other sewn products industries. The owner of Southern Supply & Manufacturing Co., Inc. was concerned about worker exposures to synthetic metalworking fluids (MWF) in the wet-grinding area of the facility. NIOSH investigators conducted a site visit on September 21-22, 2000. It included opening and closing conferences, worker interviews, and environmental monitoring. Personal breathing zone air samples of MWF were collected from all six grinders working during first shift. On an 8-hour time-weighted average basis, the exposures to the thoracic fraction of MWF aerosol ranged from 0.78 - 3.95 milligrams per cubic meter of air (mg/m3). The NIOSH Recommended Exposure Limit is 0.4 mg/m3, thoracic fraction. Each pair of grinders shares one mist collector, which is rated to draw 1200 cubic feet of air per minute. The inlets for these units were 12-18 inches behind the grinding surface. Wet-grinders' exposures to MWF were between 2 and 10 times the NIOSH Recommended Exposure Limit of 0.4 mg/m3, thoracic fraction. The local exhaust ventilation inlets are placed too far from the grinders to be effective. Recommendations are offered to reduce MWF exposures through improved enclosure and local exhaust ventilation.
• Subjects:
  Asthma Asthma, Occupational Irritants Metals Metal Workers Occupational Health Particulate Matter Respiratory Tract Diseases Safety Ventilation
• Keywords:
  Asthma Grinding Grinding-equipment Hazard-Confirmed Machine Shop Metal-workers Metalworking Metalworking-fluids Metalworking Fluid Metalworking Machinery And Equipment, Grinding Machines Mist Collector MWF OSHA Region 4 Particulates Respiratory-irritants Respiratory-system-disorders Synthetic MWF Thoracic Particulate Total Particulate Ventilation-systems

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• Series:
  Health Hazard Evaluation Reports (HHE)
• Subseries:
  Health Evaluation and Technical Assistance (HETA)
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.26616/NIOSHHETA200002622833
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Field Study
• Place as Subject:
  Florida ; OSHA Region 4
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  DSHEFS - Division of Surveillance, Hazard Evaluations, and Field Studies
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  16 pdf pages
• Contributor:
  Butler, David ; Grote, Ardith A.
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20021514
• NTIS Accession Number:
  PB2003-100109
• Citation:
  Cincinnati, OH: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, HETA 2000-0262-2833, 2001 Mar ; :1-8
• Editor(s):
  Rooney, Terry L.
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2001
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• NAICS and SIC Codes:
  3541 - Machine tools, metal cutting types - (SIC)
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:1e173fa72835b18f9eaa2a772291ef7d975468d92a632d5e88dffd9d81678d1027098086260274e3c8d482810dc561b67d3ca8b3e4ad1abd369a4c482717ed79
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/170921/cdc_170921_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 203.32 KB ]