Logging is by far deadliest job, followed by fishing, roofing, waste, iron and steel, driving, farming

Logging remained the deadliest job in 2015, says a report by the U.S. Department of Labor. Overall, the U.S. had 4,836 fatal work injuries in 2015, up from 4,821 in 2014. Of those fatalities, 2,054 involved transportation; 800 involved falls, slips or trips, 722 involved contact with objects or equipment, 703 came from violence or injuries caused by persons or animals (417 were homicides), 424 were caused by exposure to harmful substances or environments, and 121 by fires and explosions. (BLS graphics: Civilian occupation fatal work injuries in 2015)

Among civilian occupations, logging resulted in 132.7 deaths per 100,000 workers. Next was fishing (54.8), aircraft pilots and flight engineers (40.4), roofers (39.7), refuse and recyclable materials collectors (38.8), structural iron and steel workers (29.8), drivers/sales workers and truck drivers (24.3), farmers, ranchers and other agricultural managers (22), electrical power-line installers and repairers (20.5) and first-line supervisors of landscape, lawn service and groundskeeping workers (18.1). Drivers/sales workers and truck drivers had the most overall deaths, 885, with farmers, ranchers and other agricultural managers second with 252 deaths.

Among industrial categories, agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting had the highest rate, at 22.8 per every 100,000 workers. Construction had the most deaths, 937. That was followed by transportation and warehousing (765), agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting (570), professional and business services (477), government (457), manufacturing (353), retail trade (269), leisure and hospitality (225), other services such as public administration (202), wholesale trade (175), educational and health services (139), mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction (120), financial activities (83), information (42) and utilities (22).

E&E News graphic:
Fatal injuries in oil and gas  industry

When it comes to oil and gas, 50.6 percent of fatalities (45 of 89) involved transportation, Pamela King reports for Energywire. The total number of oil-and-gas fatalities dropped 38 percent in 2015, down from 144 deaths in 2014. Seventy-three of the 2014 deaths involved transportation, and more than 90 percent of them are credited with a lack of people wearing a safety harness. Transportation deaths remained steady in 2014 and 2015, at 50 to 51 percent, but those figures were up from 39 percent in 2013.