TOWN OF SHAWANGUNK – Last Tuesday morning at 10:30, two men installing structural steel atop an addition to the Redeemer Presbyterian Church on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, fell five floors down an elevator shaft to their deaths.

Both men were veteran ironworkers; 51-year old Roy Powell was from New Paltz, and 49-year old Brett McEnroe from Dover Plains.

There was an immediate rush to judgment by major media outlets, each in turn looking at the iron work sub-contractor on the site, Cross County Contracting, Inc, a local firm based in the Town of Shawangunk.

Over the past decade, Cross County has been hit four times with serious safety violations by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Since 1996, the company has paid $31,000 in fines. All neat and simple, case closed?

Except that it's not neat and simple. Talking with the owners of Cross County, John and Candace Tracy, the messy outlines of reality soon make themselves apparent.

"It's been a horrific week," said John Tracy. "I worked with both of those guys for many, many years. This was just a devastating tragedy for us."

Tracy described the situation the men were working in. "They were at the top of an elevator shaft that came up through the existing building. As the shaft was built, we put in the steel work, floor by floor. And to do that we put in a wooden platform floor, and then inside the shaft, erect scaffolding. Our guys then work on that."

"The work had been interrupted by the bad winter weather, so this was the first day back on that particular part of the job. And for some unknown reason, they didn't put in a platform, and they didn't tie off — that is hooking their safety harnesses onto something solid. If they'd done either of those things, this tragedy wouldn't have happened."

"They were placing steel beams on the top of the masonry. There were two other workers from our company with them. Those two guys were tied off in their harnesses and were working outside the shaft, on the general contractor's scaffolding."

"There was a steel beam set in pockets there, and there has to be some room for adjustment on those beams. It was loose enough that it rolled under them and they fell. That's what we understand at this point."

Candace Tracy said, "Steel erection is a very high risk business, and it's held to a lot of rules. Our workers have all the training, the safety equipment and enforcement in place to comply with all those rules. But human error is always there."

"Brett won an award just this past December," she added, "for working safely, installing steel in an elevator shaft at the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manhattan."

SAFETY HISTORY
As for the company's safety history, John Tracy explained:

"What they call 'serious violations' are those that would put someone's life in danger. So, one of our violations came a few years ago. We had twenty workers on a job, and one of them, after coffee, didn't put his harness on and was photographed by OSHA. And this is due to the fact that workers get very comfortable and relaxed with the workplace, even though it has its dangers, and so they forget to tie off, or put on their harness. If you look around this industry, everyone's got violations."

"Another of the four serious violations for us was with a worker who is known for always doing the right thing and going by the book. He always ties off. But he had to move from one position to the next, and while he was doing that he wasn't tied off, and he was photographed while he was untied and moving. And from that you had a violation."

Candace Tracy added, "We understand perfectly why OSHA is there, and why they're doing their job. Everyone, and that includes workers, management and OSHA knows the dangers and knows the safety procedures that are in place to prevent these kinds of accidents."

"Safety is something we take very seriously. We have safety audits on a regular basis that are carried out by Lovell Safety Management. And you have to understand, if we were seriously in violation, our insurance costs would become prohibitive. To stay in business in this industry you absolutely have to pay attention to safety."

John Tracy summed up a terrible period for his company. "We're a family business, and we think of our employees as part of the family. Brett and Roy had been with us for years. This has just been horrific."

"Looking ahead, the only thing we can do is to continue to implement all the safety procedures and train our workers to follow them."