OSHA Postpones Crane Operator Certification Requirements

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has announced plans to extend the compliance date for its crane operator certification requirement to November 10, 2017 in order to revisit the record on operator certification.

The additional three years would, OSHA says, provide time to partially re-open the crane rule to address industry concerns over the “certifying by capacity” requirement and whether certification is equivalent to qualification.

“The three-year window will give us time to re-examine the issue of certifying by capacity and the proper way to ensure crane operators are qualified,” said Director of OSHA’s Directorate of Construction, Jim Maddux at a meeting of the Advisory Committee on Construction Safety and Health (ACCSH) in Washington, DC, May 23, 2013.  He indicated that OSHA had put a team in place which had been tasked with ensuring that “we have a good crane standard to ensure crane safety.”

For more information, read the official OSHA trade news release, or visit the National Commission for the Certification of Crane Operators article.