Health and Safety Failings – LOLER breach leads to worker losing leg

LOLER breach leads to worker losing leg

Key Facts:

• 49-year-old factory worker struck by 850kg frame
• Frame fell two metres before landing on worker’s leg following LOLER breach
• Due to resulting injuries, worker’s left leg needed to be amputated
• Two firms fined nearly £50,000 and costs following HSE investigation

The case:

In an incident on 5 January 2012 a 49-year-old factory worker was struck by a metal framing weighing 850kg as it was being delivered to a plant in Glossop.

The five metre long frame had been manufactured by the worker’s employer and had been loaded, on an angle, onto a pickup truck at an angle using an overhead crane and chains, with the top end resting on a supporting bar above the driver’s cab. The chains that were taken from two separate chain sets – one of which was significantly longer than the other – to allow for the angle of the lift.

It was then delivered to the company it had been built for, where it was lifted off the truck using the same chains, this time attached to a forklift truck.

In the process of taking the frame off the truck, the shorter chains freed themselves from the hook on the forklift truck which caused the frame to fall roughly two metres to the ground, where it landed on the factory worker’s left foot.

The resulting damage of the LOLER breach was so severe that the 49-year-old worker’s left leg eventually had to be amputated to above the knee for medical reasons.

On 27 February 2015 Derby Crown Court heard how neither of the two companies had planned how the metal frame was going to be lifted safely on and off the pickup truck, which was itself unsuitable for the job of transporting the metal frame. The crane and forklift truck used as lifting equipment were also both completely unsuitable for the job. The companies failed to ensure the frame would be safely transported.

The manufacturing company were found guilty of a breach of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1874, and were subsequently fined £11,917, and costs of £13,734.

The company the frame was delivered to pleaded guilty to a LOLER breach (a single breach of the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998) by failing to ensure that work had been properly planned, appropriately supervised and carried out safely. As a result, they were fined £12,000 and ordered to pay £8,735 in costs.

What the HSE Inspector had to say:

Speaking after the hearing, HSE Inspector Scott Wynne stated that:

“The failings of both companies contributed to this incident, which could so easily have been avoided had more thought gone into the planning of the loading, unloading and transport of the metal frame.

“The methods adopted for both the loading at Russell Fabrications (UK) Ltd and the unloading at Delpro Ltd were inherently unsafe and the vehicle used to transport the frame was unsuitable as the loading area was too small to safely accommodate it.

“Unfortunately the failings of the two companies have led to a worker suffering life changing and permanently disabling injuries.”

What the law states:

Regulation 8(1) of the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 states that:

“Every employer shall ensure that every lifting operation involving lifting equipment is properly planned by a competent person, appropriately supervised, and carried out in a safe manner.”

Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 states that:

“It shall be the duty of every employer to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all his employees.”

Further information from the HSE on improving safety in the manufacturing industry can be found here.

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