PITTSBURGH -- The U.S. Department of Labor says one of every six fatalities on construction sites is related to substance abuse. It's a serious problem in an already dangerous line of work.

Team 4 watched, day after day, as construction workers at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center project in downtown Pittsburgh consumed a liquid lunch.

The following investigative report by Jim Parsons first aired Feb. 26, 2003, on WTAE Action News at 6 p.m.

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Video

Hidden Camera Footage

It's lunch time for construction workers at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center. Some go get a sandwich and a soda, but others consume a different kind of lunch. In a two-month investigation, Team 4 found workers regularly piling into nearby bars by the dozen.

A place just one block away from the center is the most popular lunchtime watering hole. It's often packed with construction workers drinking beers and shots.

One welder went to the bar every day we watched. Sometimes he ate, sometimes not. But he always drank three to four beers and usually downed a shot of whiskey. All of it was consumed in 30 minutes. Then, it was back to the work site.

Eric Nelson and Sam Church are occupational safety consultants. We asked them to view our hidden camera video. They had not met each other until Team 4 brought them together, but they shared the same opinion about these drinking workers.

Nelson: "Those guys that drink on the job increase the chances of killing someone else."

Church: "They're creating a tremendous danger to themselves and possibly others."

Nelson: "It's not a beer, or even a shot and a beer, that we're looking at on that job site. It's a double shot and three beers."

Two workers were lunchtime regulars at the bar, usually downing four mugs of beer and a double shot of whiskey each. One day, we followed them back to the job site and found them installing heating and air conditioning units while operating scissors lifts.

One worker gulped a double shot of whiskey. Less than a half-hour later, we found him directing traffic on Penn Avenue so a boom crane could maneuver on the street.

Church: "The images we saw of the consumption in a 30-minute period -- I don't care how large the drinker is, a shot and three or four or maybe more drinks in a 30-minute period is definitely going to create impairment."

And impairment can be deadly.

Six years ago, when a drunken crane operator returned to work at a construction site in Columbus, Ohio, the crane toppled over onto a city street and crushed a passing car. The driver was killed and the crane operator was convicted of vehicular homicide.

Steve Leeper knows all about fatal construction accidents. As head of Pittsburgh's Sports and Exhibition Authority, he was in charge of defending workplace safety at the Convention Center last February when ironworker Paul Corsi fell to his death. That accident was unrelated to alcohol.

Leeper, from Feb. 2002: "We can assure everybody that we had no lapses in terms of safety."

Leeper says he is concerned about the workers we caught drinking multiple beers and shots. But he says some drinking during workhours is acceptable, as long as workers return to work with a blood-alcohol content of less than 0.04.

Parsons: "How many beers is OK?"

Leeper: "Enough to keep you below the 0.04 level."

Parsons: "It's OK, as far as you're concerned, for construction workers to leave the site and go have a beer or two as long as they're below 0.04?"

Leeper: "That's what the agreement is. That's what is generally stated by the agencies and organizations. Otherwise, you start to question people's civil rights."

But our safety consultants say forbidding drinking on the job has nothing to do with civil rights.

Nelson: "The issue of, from my perspective as a safety guy, that a shot and a beer or even a beer at lunch is acceptable -- those days are long gone. You know, it used to be acceptable to kill a lot more workers in this town in years past.

Nelson: "We do not agree with eliminating workers or allowing them to eliminate themselves because we want them to throw a few back at lunch."

Parsons to Leeper: "It doesn't concern you that you have a bar filled with Convention Center construction workers who are drinking?"

Leeper: "Yes, it concerns me. But I'm not going to sit here and blow the alarm that we have a major alcohol problem."

In fact, Leeper has no way of knowing if he has a major problem. That's because there has been virtually no testing of workers for alcohol.

Parsons: "It's not a major problem? How often have you tested? Random tested for alcohol?"

Leeper: "Once."

Parsons: "Once. And this project is how old?"

Leeper: "Three years."

Parsons: "Three years. And you've tested once for alcohol?"

Leeper: "Uh huh."

Leeper says job site supervisors keep an eye out for intoxicated workers, and they've sent 51 home for having alcohol on their breath.

Leeper says on-site alcohol testing lowers worker producitivity and morale. Our safety experts disagree.

Nelson: "The 90 percent of the workers on that job site that aren't drinking, they very much appreciate it. They have no desire to be working beside a guy that just did a double shot and three beers. But unfortunately, sometimes they're put in that position."

Leeper says all workers are screened for drugs before they are allowed on site. There have also been six project-wide, random drug screenings. But again, only one screening for alcohol.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has no regulation on this for construction workers. It's up to individual companies and unions to have their own policies. Many of them around the nation have zero-tolerance policies for any alcohol or drug use.

At the Convention Center, 0.04 is acceptable. For a 190-pound person, 0.04 is 1 1/2 bottles of beer.

Related Link:
Drunkenness Calculator