A Sheffield company now in liquidation has been ordered to pay nearly £425,000 in fines and costs after an employee was killed by an overturning skip lorry in Derbyshire.
David Vickers, 37, of Walton, was tipping a skip at Adis Scaffolding Ltd’s site in Markham Lane, Duckmanton, when the incident occurred, on 22 July 2008. The company crushes rubble from construction and demolition waste.
Sitting on 7 June, Derby Crown Court heard that Mr Vickers had exited the cab of the truck he was driving to deploy the stabilising rear outriggers. He began raising a skip using the lifting arms but, as he did so, the vehicle overturned and fell on top of him. He died at the scene.
The HSE investigated the incident and found the skip had not been hooked correctly. Instead of interlocking with the skip’s catch bar, the hooks engaged with the lip of a base plate.
The skip tipped in the normal fashion until reaching an angle of about 70 degrees, at which point it broke free and swung backwards, causing the front of the vehicle to lift several feet off the ground. During the course of tipping, the offside outrigger also retracted, causing the lorry to tip over.
The HSE investigation also established: there was no safe system of work for the skip operation, including how to address mis-hooking and other foreseeable problems; there was inadequate training and instruction; the skip-lorry controls were not marked; and the risk assessment for loading and unloading skips fell short of identifying all significant risks and controls.
Adis Scaffolding Limited, now in liquidation but formerly of Queen Street, Sheffield, was fined £300,000 and ordered to pay £124,468 in costs after pleading guilty to breaching s2(1) of the HSWA 1974.
After the hearing, HSE inspector Edward Walker said: “The failings by Adis Scaffolding Limited were substantial, ranging from unsuitable equipment, an inadequate risk assessment, inadequate training and instruction, and an absence of safe systems of work.
“These failings led to a situation in which things went badly wrong, and where David was placed in an impossible situation. His tragic death could easily have been avoided with better planning, management and foresight.”
As a result of the incident, the HSE issued an industry-wide safety alert highlighting the dangers of incorrect engagement of hooks on skips.
Approaches to managing the risks associated Musculoskeletal disorders
In this episode of the Safety & Health Podcast, we hear from Matt Birtles, Principal Ergonomics Consultant at HSE’s Science and Research Centre, about the different approaches to managing the risks associated with Musculoskeletal disorders.
Matt, an ergonomics and human factors expert, shares his thoughts on why MSDs are important, the various prevalent rates across the UK, what you can do within your own organisation and the Risk Management process surrounding MSD’s.
