Safety Officers

Here is how the work lines up. Film production safety in New York operates under a layered framework that global producers always underestimate on arrival. OSHA federal standards backed by New York State Department of Labor enforcement, the OSHA 30 mandate that the Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment imposes on each IATSE crew working in the city, the FDNY Film Safety Officer licensing regime that becomes required above 50 feet of working height or whenever a script involves SFX, open flame, pyrotechnics or stunts, and the NYC Department of Buildings stunt and high-rise permitting workflow that runs alongside any rigging or rooftop work in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens.

Here is what that looks like on the ground. The safety officers on our roster hold OSHA 30 cards as the baseline, today's FDNY Certificate of Fitness credentials in the types shoots actually need (F-60, F-61, S-95 and the pyrotechnic-exact endorsements), IATSE Local 161 safety credentials and the NY State Department of Labor workers' compensation and disability records that lets them operate as the line-producer's safety lead through pre-production, principal photography and wrap.

Here is how the picture comes together. On set, our New York safety officers run pre-shoot location surveys, write site-exact safety plans for FDNY review when stunts and effects are in play, brief cast and crew at the start of each shooting day, monitor stunt and pyrotechnic work alongside the stunt coordinator under FDNY oversight, supervise water sequences on the Hudson, the East River and the Long Island Sound, and manage the heat-stress and cold-stress protocols that NYC summer humidity and winter Hudson Valley shoots routinely need.

Here is what we have to work with. They handle OSHA recordable-injury reporting through the NY State workers' compensation system, set up with FDNY EMS and the nearest Mount Sinai, NewYork-Presbyterian or NYU Langone facility for ambulance standby, liaise with NYPD Movie/TV Unit and the local precinct command for road closures and crowd safety, and produce records that satisfies both NYC regulators and the global production insurers underwriting the project.

Here is the layout. They run the FDNY film safety officer presence needed for above-50-foot work, SFX, stunts and open flame, manage the high-rise stunt-permitting workflow with NYC DOB, set up Local 817 Teamster driver safety on convoys through the Holland, Lincoln, Midtown, Brooklyn-Battery and Queens-Midtown tunnels and across the GW, Williamsburg and Brooklyn bridges, and keep deputies on standby so multi-unit New York shoots keep unbroken safety coverage. We match safety officers to exact hazards — stunts, water, fire, heights, cars, crowd work.