Workplace Fatalities in the District of Columbia, 2003-2007 (PDF)
During the years 2003 to 2007, fatal work injuries in the District of Columbia totaled 62, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor.  Please note that the 2007 results are preliminary; final results will be released in April 2009.  Sheila Watkins, the Bureau’s regional commissioner, noted that falls to a lower level1 and homicides were the leading causes of on-the-job fatalities over this time period in the District, each accounting for 18 deaths.  (See chart A.) Combined, these two events made up 58 percent of the total. Work-related deaths due to falls to a lower level represented 12 percent of the U.S. total from 2003 to 2007, while homicides accounted for 10 percent of workplace fatalities in the nation over this five-year period.
Other leading causes of fatal workplace injuries in the District of Columbia for the five year period from 2003 to 2007 were being struck by objects or equipment (4), pedestrian incidents (4), contact with electric current (3), and suicides (3). (See table 1.) Fatalities from being struck by objects or equipment and from pedestrian incidents each accounted for 6 percent of the work-related deaths in the District; nationally, these events accounted for 10 percent and 6 percent of workplace fatalities, respectively.  Deaths from contact with electric current and suicides, each at 5 percent, represented similar portions of the District’s total to their percentages nationwide.
Chart A. Percent of total fatal occupational injuries in the District of Columbia and the United States by selected event groups, 2003-2007
Fatal work injuries totaled 13 in 2007 for the District of Columbia, up from the 7 fatalities reported in 2006. (See chart A.) The yearly totals of workplace deaths in the District of Columbia have varied considerably, ranging from a low of 7 in 2006 to a high of 25 in 1993.
Chart B. Fatal occupational injuries in the District of Columbia from 1992-2007
Key characteristics of fatal work injuries from 2003 to 2007 in the District of Columbia:
- Men accounted for 56, or 90 percent, of the work-related fatalities in the District.  Assaults and violent acts accounted for 34 percent of deaths among men and falls made up 29 percent.  Six women were fatally injured on the job; falls accounted for most of these deaths. (See table 2.)Â
- Forty percent of those who died from a workplace injury in the District were black, non-Hispanic (25); 35 percent were white, non-Hispanic (22); 18 percent were Hispanic or Latino (11); and 5 percent were Asian (3). Assaults and violent acts accounted for over half of the deaths for black, non-Hispanic workers, while falls was the most frequent type of fatality for both non-Hispanic whites and Hispanic or Latino workers. (See table 2.)
- Workers 25-54 years old—the prime working age group—made up 36, or 58 percent, of the work-related fatalities in the District of Columbia from 2003 to 2007. At the national level, this group made up 64 percent of fatalities over these five years. (See table 2.)
- Eighty-five percent of workers killed on the job in the District worked for wages and salaries, the rest were self-employed. Both wage and salary and self-employed workers died primarily from assaults and violent acts and falls. (See table 2.)
- Two industry sectors made up half of the 62 workplace fatalities in the District over the five year period—construction (18) and government (13).  Falls accounted for the majority of work-related deaths in construction. In government, 77 percent of the fatalities were due to transportation incidents, falls, and exposure to harmful substances or environments. (See table 3.)
- Workers in the construction and extraction occupations had the highest number of workplace fatalities at 17, followed by those in transportation and material moving occupations with 11. Combined, these two occupational groups accounted for 45 percent of all fatal work injuries in the District of Columbia. Falls accounted for the majority of fatal injuries in the construction and extraction occupations. In the transportation and material moving occupations, assaults and violent acts comprised the most frequent event. (See table 4.)
Additional Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries data are available on the BLS Internet site at www.bls.gov/iif/. Data can be accessed in two ways, through Create Customized Tables, which allows quick access to particular items, or via the special request FTP service, which allows access to an extensive collection of flat text files. For personal assistance or further information on the Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries program, as well as other Bureau programs, contact the Mid-Atlantic Information Office at 215-597-3282 from 8:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and 1:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. ET. Information on the Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries and other programs and surveys are available on our Web site at www.bls.gov/ro3/.
Technical Note
Background of the program
The Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, part of the BLS occupational safety and health statistics program, compiles a count of all fatal work injuries occurring in the U.S. in each calendar year. The program uses diverse State, federal, and independent data sources to identify, verify, and describe fatal work injuries. This assures counts are as complete and accurate as possible.
For technical information about the CFOI program, please go to the BLS Handbook of Methods on the BLS web site. To get to that document, click on Workplace Injuries on the BLS home page, scroll down to IIF Documentation, and then click on “BLS Handbook of Methods.� The technical information and definitions for the CFOI Program are in Chapter 9, Part 2 of the BLS Handbook of Methods.
Federal/State agency coverage
The Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries includes data for all fatal work injuries, whether the decedent was working in a job covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) or other federal or State agencies or was outside the scope of regulatory coverage. Thus, any comparison between the BLS fatality census counts and those released by other agencies should take into account the different coverage requirements and definitions being used by each agency.
Several federal and State agencies have jurisdiction over workplace safety and health. OSHA and affiliated agencies in States with approved safety programs cover the largest portion of the nation's workers. However, injuries and illnesses occurring in certain industries or activities, such as coal, metal, and nonmetal mining and highway, water, rail, and air transportation, are excluded from OSHA coverage because they are covered by other federal agencies, such as the Mine Safety and Health Administration and various agencies within the Department of Transportation.
Acknowledgments
BLS thanks the District of Columbia Department of Health for their efforts in collecting accurate, comprehensive, and useful data on fatal work injuries. BLS also appreciates the efforts of all federal, State, local, and private sector entities that submitted source documents used to identify fatal work injuries. Among these agencies are the Occupational Safety and Health Administration; the National Transportation Safety Board; the U.S. Coast Guard; the Mine Safety and Health Administration; the Employment Standards Administration (Federal Employees' Compensation and Longshore and Harbor Workers' divisions); the Federal Railroad Administration; the Department of Energy; State vital statistics registrars, coroners, and medical examiners; State departments of health, labor and industries, and workers' compensation agencies; State and local police departments; and State farm bureaus.
1 Fatal events are categorized into several major groupings including transportation incidents, assaults and violent acts, and falls, among others. These major groups are further broken down into more detailed groups. See the Occupational Injury & Illness Classification System (OIICS) Manual at www.bls.gov/iif/oshoiics.htm for detailed information on the categories of fatalities used in this census.
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