OSHA cites roofing firm after worker falls 33 feet to death

A South Dakota roofing company has been cited and faces $77,000 in proposed fines from federal workplace safety regulators as a result of a 24-year-old employee falling more than 30 feet to his death.

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration cited Watertown, South Dakota-based Pro-Tec Roofing Inc. for two willful and eight serious safety violations after finding that the employer failed to provide an adequate fall protection system and train the employee on how to work safely at heights, the agency said Tuesday in a statement. The worker was installing roofing materials and was outside of a warning line placed on the roof when he fell.

“An adequate fall protection system could have prevented this worker's tragic and avoidable death,” Sheila Stanley, OSHA’s area director in Sioux Falls, said in the statement. “An employer who chooses to use a warning line with a monitor, as in this case, must maintain the warning line system, and ensure that work beyond the warning line is appropriately monitored.”

Preventable falls account for nearly 40% of all deaths in the construction industry, according to OSHA.

A company spokesman declined to comment.