Author Archives: macbrac-admin
Parish council fined for church fall
A joiner was left paralysed from the waist down after falling in a South Kensington parish church. A rail dropped when he leant on it, and he fell 3 metres, breaking his back. HSE inspection found that it could have been easily prevented if… Read more
£110,000 fine + £60,000 costs for fork-lift accident
A reversing fork-lift truck knocked over a lorry driver in Cardiff docks. It ran over his right leg, which later had to be amputated below the knee. A subsequent HSE visit found that Cargo Services (UK) Ltd, operators of the truck, had no… Read more
Myth busting
We’re all familar with the “Elf and Safety” excuse for avoiding or forbidding certain actions and activities. The HSE has set up an independent Myth Busters Challenge Panel to scrutinize such decisions. If you think a decision or advice that you… Read more
50 fatalities – 1 in 5 fail safety checks: a year in construction
There were 50 fatalities in construction last year (2010-11). As part of a national initiative to improve construction site safety, inspectors from the Health and Safety Executive visited a total 3237 sites and saw 4080 contractors, but 581 sites… Read more
£10,000 fine for fall
The worker at Hutchinson Technical Services (HTS) Ltd’s premises in Ditton Road, Widnes had been allowed to work on top of a chemical storage tank without any measures in place to prevent him being injured in a fall. When chemical vapour inside… Read more
11,000 volt cable cut – £60,000 in fines
A demolition worker in Worcester was told to cut through a cable. It was still live – connected to a switching unit on a substation on the site. He was engulfed by flames when the machine he was using to cut through the cable came into contact with… Read more
£100,000 fine for worker’s death
A worker at Montracon Ltd’s factory in Market Weighton, East Yorkshire, died from serious head injuries when a machine weighing two-thirds of a tonne fell on him. It fell after being dislodged from its mountings by a passing trailer; a number… Read more
Redditch asbestos exposure – fines and costs over £115,000
Avon Freight Group Ltd’s architect had commissioned a survey identifying asbestos insulation board in a number of partition walls, which the company wanted to demolish, and obtained estimates for its removal from three licensed contractors…. Read more
Forty-two fatalities in farming
The Health and Safety Executive’s report ‘Fatal injuries in farming, forestry, horticulture and associated industries 2010/11′ show that 42 people were killed as a result of farming and other agriculture-related activities during the year, of… Read more
Misuse of block grab kills worker
23-year-old Steven Allen was killed when workers tried to use a block grab to move cement bags, which were stacked on a pallet at a Manningham, Bradford, construction site. While moving the load, the bags fell but the pallet remained in the jaws of… Read more