Compliance with the hazardous materials regulations poses many challenges to those who need to ship hazardous materials—from understanding whether your material is covered by the rules to knowing what employee training is needed to recognizing the most common hazmat violations. In a recent webinar titled Hazmat Shipping: How to Ensure Compliance with DOT Air and Ground Transport Regulations, speaker Linda Lawhorn, senior transportation specialist at Edgewater Technical Associates, provided guidance as to the 10 most important things to know about shipping hazmat.

Lawhorn noted that three of the most recent frequently cited violations are in connection with training and testing, insufficient documentation, and failure to obtain a Department of Transportation Certificate of Hazmat Registration for shipping and transport of certain materials. Two of the four questions posed by attendees during the webinar concerned training and evidenced the not uncommon confusion as to who must be trained and what training is needed.

Of the many helpful tips offered by Lawhorn, one dealt with a hazmat issue that she said regulators are “all over”—a shipper’s failure to close a specification package in accordance with the package’s closure instructions. She advised shippers to read and follow package instructions “exactly” and to check the container’s tested gross mass rating to ensure that you don’t put more in the package than you should.

Another frequent problem that Lawhorn says is usually a top 4 or 5 violation is the failure by many shippers to provide the proper emergency response information to instruct the responders as to what to do in the event of an emergency. To cover the requirements of 49 CFR 172.602 concerning information about the hazmat being transported, Lawhorn recommended providing a safety data sheet (SDS) and a copy of the 2016 Emergency Response Guidebook page that provides response guidance for the material being shipped. Lawhorn noted that it’s critical but often overlooked that the emergency response telephone number required by 49 CFR 172.604 be monitored at all times the hazardous material is in transportation, including storage that is incidental to transportation.

Here are the 10 questions Lawhorn asked and answered during the course of the webinar:

• What are hazardous materials?
• What kinds of functions are performed by hazmat employees?
• What about training and testing?
• What about books?
• What about identification and classification?
• What about packaging?
• What about marking, labeling, and placarding?
• What about documentation?
• What about hazardous waste?
• What about registration?

Learn the answers to these questions and more by accessing this on-demand webinar from the above link.

The webinar concluded with a list of resources hazmat shippers and transporters may find helpful to answer their specific questions about how to ship their hazardous materials.