LI Contractor To Cease Digging, Pay Fine In 2 Trench Deaths: OSHA

UPPER BROOKVILLE, NY — A Long Island contracting company has agreed to cease digging excavations and to pay about $136,000 in penalties stemming from a 30-foot trench that collapsed killing two workmen last year, according to a recent news release from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

The workers were installing septic rings at a private home near Wolver Hollow and Pine Valley roads in Upper Brookville in January 2020, and while both men were in the hole, a wall of dirt and sand "gave way,” Nassau County police Lt. Richard LeBrun told News 12 back in January 2020.

Deniz Dos Santos Almeida, 57, and Max Antonio Turcios, 46, died when they became trapped under 5 feet of dirt, police said.

Following an investigation, OSHA investigators found RC Structures Inc. of Roslyn did not have a protective system in place to prevent a trench collapse, and did not remove the workers from the trench “after a competent person employed by the company had identified a cave-in hazard,” OSHA officials said in the March 31 news release.

OSHA also found that the trench “lacked an adequate ladder or other safe means of exit” and RC Structures “allowed stacked concrete and excavated materials to be stored at the trench’s edge,” the news release stated. Workers who were adjacent to and beneath an operating excavator lacked head protection, allowing them to be vulnerable to being struck by debris, OSHA officials said.

OSHA cited RC Structures for “willfull and serious violations” in July 2020, but the company contested the violations to the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, OSHA officials stated.

In addition to ceasing digging and paying the penalty fee, the company has also agreed to develop an excavation safety checklist to identify hazards and protective measures for work in excavations, and also to ensure a competent person on site will consult and complete the checklist whenever workers enter excavations, according to OSHA officials.

The company must also engage a “qualified professional safety and health consultant” to conduct at least one on-site assessment of excavation safety while employees are performing work in an excavation, OSHA officials said, adding that it must arrange company-wide ladder safety and hardhat use training for employees.

“A trench can collapse suddenly and with great force, crushing and burying workers in an instant, said OSHA Long Island Area Director Kevin Sullivan in Westbury. “Amid such dangerous conditions, employers must follow all excavation safety requirements and remove employees to prevent tragedies like this.”

Regional Solicitor of Labor Jeffrey S. Rogoff said that “no settlement can undo the collapse and its consequences, but it does “obligate” the contractor to institute “corrective actions to enhance safe work in excavations and prevent future collapses, injuries and deaths.”

“The U.S. Department of Labor is committed to enforcing workplace safety laws and achieving settlements designed to prevent hazards from recurring,” he added.

RC Structures did not respond to a request for comment.

Daniel Hampton contributed additional reporting to this story.