The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports increases in fatal workplace injury, with steep increases in deaths from falls and being struck by objects:

• Fatal falls increased by 17 percent to a new series high, led by increases in the number of fatal falls from ladders and from roofs. The increase in fatal falls was led by a 39 percent increase in the number of workers who were fatally injured after a fall from a roof (from 128 fatalities in 2003 to 178 in 2004) and a 17 percent increase in the number of fatal falls from ladders (from 114 fatalities in 2003 to 133 in 2004). The totals for falls from roofs and for falls from ladders represented new series highs for these events. About 88 percent of the fatal falls from roofs involved construction workers, compared with about 54 percent for fatal falls overall.
• Fatal work injuries resulting from being struck by an object rose 12 percent in 2004, and overtook workplace homicide as the third most frequent type of fatal event.
• Fatal highway incidents were up slightly in 2004 after declining the two previous years. The 1,374 fatal highway incidents recorded in 2004 represented about one out of every four fatal work injuries in 2004. Although nonhighway incidents (such as those that might occur on a farm or industrial premises) dropped slightly in 2004, other kinds of transportation incidents increased, led by incidents involving workers struck by vehicles or mobile equipment.
• Fatal work injuries among Hispanic workers were up 11 percent in 2004 after declining the previous two years.
• The number of fatal work injuries among older workers (55 years of age and older) rose 10 percent in 2004, but fatalities among younger workers (16 to 24 years of age) declined.
• A total of 5,703 fatal work injuries were recorded in the United States in 2004, an increase of 2 percent from the revised total of 5,575 fatal work injuries reported for 2003.
• The increase in the fatality rate in 2004 was the first since 1994, when the rate was 5.3 fatalities per 100,000 workers.