OSHA issued multiple citations including under Section 5(a)(1) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, alleging that employees were exposed to serious hazards because the trusses were installed without adequate temporary or permanent bracing consistent with the design engineer’s plans. Following a trial, the Administrative Law Judge (the ALJ) affirmed that citation as to the bracing failure. 

The General Duty Clause requires employers to furnish a workplace free from recognized hazards likely to cause death or serious physical harm. In the absence of a specific OSHA standard, here governing every aspect of truss erection, the Secretary (of Labor) relied on the General Duty Clause. To prevail, OSHA was required to show four elements: the existence of a hazard, industry recognition of that hazard, the likelihood of serious injury or death and the existence of a feasible and effective means of abatement.

The court found all four elements satisfied with respect to the lack of adequate bracing. The hazard was defined narrowly and appropriately: long-span trusses installed without sufficient temporary or permanent bracing are prone to twisting, buckling and collapse. The decision emphasized that hazard analysis under the General Duty Clause focuses on the cited condition itself, not on whether the precise accident was inevitable. If a collapse can occur under reasonably predictable circumstances, the hazard exists. 

Expert testimony from both sides acknowledged that inadequately braced trusses pose a serious danger. Even the employer’s own experts agreed that long trusses such as the wooden truss at issue here, have minimal inherent stability without bracing and must be restrained during installation. The court also relied on industry guidance materials warning that most truss accidents occur during installation and that improper bracing can result in collapse, serious injury or death. 

This matters because employers can assume that if guidance documents are labeled “advisory,” they are irrelevant to enforcement. The decision makes clear that while such documents are not mandatory standards, they remain powerful evidence of hazard recognition across the industry. One of the employer’s principal defenses was that OSHA was improperly attempting to enforce unincorporated industry standards, such as ANSI/TPI or BCSI guidance, through the General Duty Clause. The court rejected that framing. OSHA did not cite those materials as binding rules. Instead, they were offered as examples of feasible means to reduce or eliminate a recognized hazard.

Critically, the ALJ reiterated a point that OSHA does not need to prove that an employer failed to follow a specific industry manual. It only needs to show that feasible measures existed and that the employer failed to implement adequate protection. Employers remain free to choose alternative methods, but those methods must actually work. Here, the problem was not that the employer preferred permanent bracing over temporary bracing, but that it failed to install all of the permanent bracing required by the engineer’s design at the time employees were exposed. 

The feasible means of abatement identified by the ALJ were neither novel nor burdensome. They included installing the required bracing in accordance with the engineer’s plans and ensuring that the truss system was adequately restrained during erection. The record showed that the missing bracing would have been readily apparent to supervisory personnel and could have been corrected before employees were exposed to the hazard. This point is particularly important for superintendents and foremen. The ALJ found both actual and constructive knowledge because supervisors were present and the bracing deficiencies were visible. Where a hazard is open and obvious, a lack of intent or competing construction priorities offers little protection. 

The practical lessons from this decision are direct:

• First, bracing plans are not paperwork exercises. If an engineer’s design calls for specific permanent or temporary bracing, that bracing must be installed before workers are exposed. Partial compliance is not compliance.
• Second, means-and-methods discretion has limits and although contractors may select how they brace a structure, they cannot choose an option that exposes employees to collapse hazards.
• Third, supervision matters. When supervisors are onsite and hazards are visible, OSHA will easily establish knowledge of the violative condition. 
• Finally, although industry manuals may not be enforceable standards, they reflect collective industry experience about where things go wrong and ignoring them increases both the risk of injury and the likelihood of enforcement.

This decision reinforces the point that under the General Duty Clause, OSHA will hold employers accountable when basic bracing protections are missing and workers are placed in harm’s way. 

About the author: Costas Cyprus, Esq., is a partner at the firm of Welby, Brady & Greenblatt, LLP, in White Plains, NY. He practices construction law and commercial litigation and can be reached at 914-428-2100 and at ccyprus@wbgllp.com. The articles in this series do not constitute legal advice and are intended for general guidance only.

Published: February 17, 2026.