Welcome to HSE prosecutions in brief. An overview of this weeks prosecutions by the HSE.
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Yorkshire trailer firm fined £100,000 over driver’s death
A worker died when a six-metre steel machine landed on top of him after it was dislodged from overhead brackets at a factory in East Yorkshire.
Ronald Wood, 59, from Holme-on-Spalding-Moor, was struck on the head by the steel vacuum lifter, which weighed two-thirds of a tonne, when it was knocked from its mountings by a trailer being towed out of the Montracon factory.
A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation following the fatal incident exposed serious safety failings at the company’s premises on Holme Road in Market Weighton.
Hull Crown Court heard that Mr Wood, a driver and long-standing employee of Montracon, was standing underneath the steel lifter with a fellow worker as a large trailer, which was being towed out of the factory, hit the brackets holding the machine in place. The impact knocked it loose and it fell more than three and a half metres – landing on top of Mr Wood. His colleague escaped with only a minor injury.
Mr Wood, who was a grandfather, never regained consciousness and died in hospital the same day.
Montracon Ltd., registered at Carr Hill, Doncaster, South Yorkshire, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to two breaches of Health and Safety legislation. It was fined a total of £100,000 and ordered to pay £33,030 in costs.
Full story through the link.
Company fined after worker sustains serious burns
An employee of an Oxfordshire-based engineering company sustained life-threatening burns after striking a high voltage electric cable during construction work on the new Crossrail railway.
Fugro Engineering Services Ltd was appointed principal contractor to deliver a series of ground investigations, known as Package 16, as part of the multi-billion pound project to connect Maidenhead, Shenfield and Abbey Wood to central London.
At a sentencing hearing today, the Central Criminal Court heard that on 7 February 2008, a Fugro employee was using a hydraulic breaker to create an inspection pit for a borehole outside 1 Hanover Street, London, when he struck a high voltage electric cable.
The employee, who was 63 at the time of the incident, suffered severe injuries as he was treated for 60 per cent burns.
Fugro Engineering Services Ltd, of Wallingford, Oxfordshire, had pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 in relation to the incident. The company was fined £55,000 and ordered to pay £30,000 in costs.
Read full story through the link.
Fall from height leads to fines
Two Nottingham companies have been fined after a worker fell more than nine metres, injuring his back.
The 38-year-old employee of M-tech Engineering Limited fell from a mobile tower scaffold being used to install a steel staircase at a building in Convent Street, Nottingham, on 15 April 2009.
He fractured two vertebrae and was off work for almost seven months.
The building was undergoing extensive refurbishment. Thomas Long & Sons Limited were the principal contractor and M-tech Engineering Limited had been contracted to install the staircase.
The system of work was developed by M-tech Engineering.
A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found the scaffold tower had not been erected to the manufacturer’s instructions or industry guidelines, the tower was supported on a platform that was not sufficiently rigid to provide a suitable base and the working platform was not fitted with adequate guardrails to prevent falls.
M-tech Engineering Limited, of Third Avenue, Greasley, Bulwell, Nottingham, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 for failing to ensure the health, safety and welfare of its employees. Today, Nottingham magistrates fined the company £8,000 and ordered it to pay costs of £4,000.
Thomas Long & Sons Limited, of Mile End Road, Colwick, Nottingham pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 22(1)(a) of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 for failing to plan, manage and monitor construction in a way that ensured it was carried out without risks to health and safety. Magistrates fined the company £6,000 with costs of £3,000.
Full story through the link.
Leading horse trainer in court after worker’s fall
The owner of racing stables in North Yorkshire has been prosecuted after a yard worker fell more than three metres through a skylight in a stable block.
Paul Cussons, who had worked at Thorndale Farm near Richmond for 26 years, was asked by trainer and bloodstock agent Alan Swinbank to cut down some overhanging trees above an ageing stable block before planned renovation work.
Northallerton Magistrates’ Court heard today (29 February) that Mr Cussons, who lives in Burrill, a village outside Bedale, had not been trained in either the use of a chainsaw or in how to work safely at height.
He took a chainsaw onto the roof of the stable block but as he was sawing through the branches he slipped on some leaves and fell through a skylight, landing on the concrete floor below. He broke both shoulder blades, fractured a rib and punctured a lung.
Mr Alan Swinbank, of Thorndale Farm, Melsonby, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2 (1) of the Health & Safety at Work etc Act 1974. He was fined £10,000 and ordered to pay £6,048 in costs.
Full story through the link.
London manufacturer fined for major safety breaches
A manufacturing company based in Uxbridge has been fined for a series of health and safety breaches which put its employees at risk.
The large number of Notices were issued between September 2010 and March 2011, after a wide range of health and safety failings were discovered at the company’s premises.
HSE found the company had failed to provide suitable storage for highly flammable liquids, had not examined lifting equipment, had not provided training for operators of lifting equipment, had not checked local exhaust ventilation systems, not provided suitable respiratory protective equipment for sprayers, had not repaired defective electrical systems and failed to protect workers from dangerous moving parts of machinery.
Skyways Shopfitters Ltd of Sky Studios, Morgans Yard, Arundel Road in Uxbridge pleaded guilty to breaching section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. The company was fined £18,000 and ordered to pay full costs of £6,210.
Comments from the HSE through the link.
Film company fined after cameraman hurt on set
A production company has been fined after a cameraman fell more than three metres from the set of a forthcoming major film.
The 62-year-old was working on the set of 47 Ronin at Shepperton Studios, Middlesex, when he fell through an opening in the floor. The opening was for access to a raised area via stairs, but had not been guarded to prevent people falling through it.
The cameraman, who suffered bruising and suspected broken ribs, was employed by Warrior Productions Limited, which was responsible for the production of the film in the United Kingdom and was in control of the set.
A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation into the incident on 10 May 2010 found that because the film is set in 18th Century Japan the set had been built without edge protection to make it look authentic. Temporary protection had been added in some areas but not where the cameraman fell. Guardrails were added immediately after the incident.
Warrior Productions Limited, of Prospect House, New Oxford Street, London, was fined £300, ordered to pay costs of £10,500 and ordered to pay the injured person £300 compensation for breaching Regulation 6(3) of the Work at Height Regulations 2005.
Comments from the HSE through the link.
Worker seriously burned after cutting through 11,000 volt cable in Worcester
Two companies have been fined after a demolition worker was engulfed in flames when he cut through a live 11,000 volt cable at an electricity substation in Worcester.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) prosecuted Birmingham firm DSM Demolition Ltd and Halesowen-based Gould Singleton Architects Ltd (GSA) following the incident on 14 July 2006.
Worcester Crown Court heard today that DSM was demolishing a metal casting foundry in Wainwright Road, Worcester, when employee Lee Harris, 35, was told to cut through a cable, which was connected to a switching unit on a substation on the site, which was still live.
As the machine he was using to cut through the cable came into contact with the live conductors, he was engulfed by flames, suffering 20 per cent burns, which have left him with permanent disabilities and requiring skin grafts.
DSM Demolition Ltd, of Arden Road, Birmingham, was found guilty on 26 September 2011 of breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act. The company was today fined £40,000 and ordered to pay £100,000 costs.
Gould Singleton Architects Ltd, of Whitehall Road, Halesowen, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and Regulation 15(3)(e) of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994. The company was fined £20,000 and ordered to pay £20,872 costs.
Full story through the link.
Fines after workers exposed to asbestos
An Ammanford-based knitwear company and a cladding firm site foreman have been fined for putting workers and visitors at risk of exposure to asbestos.
Corgi Hosiery Ltd contracted Dragon Cladding Ltd to remove an asbestos cement sheet roof at their New Road branch in Ammanford, Carmarthenshire
Having received a complaint about the work, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) visited the site on the 22nd October 2008, and found roofers had removed the asbestos sheets from the roof, but they had also removed plaster-like material from the underside of the sheets and structural steelwork.
HSE inspectors stopped the work immediately and tests confirmed the plaster-like material contained asbestos.
On further investigation it was found that Dragon Cladding Ltd’s site foreman Stuart Phillips, 27, had instructed two workers to use a hammer and chisel to remove the plaster-like material from the building steelwork.
Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court heard no effort was made to establish what this material was prior to work commencing, and the debris was swept into domestic black bin bags and placed in open skips.
Throughout the duration of the work, Corgi Hosiery employees had continuous access to the main building, with one worker based in the area throughout the works. Visitors to the premises were not excluded from the works area and were also potentially exposed to asbestos.
Mr Phillips, of Llangadog in Carmarthenshire, was found to have failed to adequately assess the risks, plan the work and implement a safe system of work. He pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing and today was fined a total of £4,000 for breaching Regulations 11 (1) (a) and 16 of the Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations 2006 (£2,000 per regulation), by virtue of Section 37 (1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. He was also ordered to pay £1,000 costs.
Corgi Hosiery Ltd, of Ammanford in Carmarthenshire, was found guilty of failing to prevent exposure of its employees to asbestos at an earlier hearing and was today fined £25,000 for breaching Regulation 11(1) of the Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations 2006, with £15,000 costs.
Full story through the link.
