28 June Fire Door Safety Week The humble Fire Door is often neglected and mistreated 23 September – 29 September 2019 is Fire Door Safety Week. Fire doors save life and property. This campaign aims to engage and educate building owners and building users on how to use them properly. An excellent resource is available here! Read More
27 June Fire Risk – “too awful to contemplate” People still put profit before safety. The man who created a fire safety risk that was described as “too awful to contemplate” by massive overcrowding during at an event at York’s Kuda nightclub has been given a suspended prison sentence. The club was rated to a safe capacity of 645, but during a Basshunter event … Read More
19 June Major Supermarkets are recalling various products Four of the big-name supermarkets are pulling products from the shelves amid health and safety concerns. Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda and Morrisons stores across Stoke-on-Trent and North Staffordshire are all withdrawing items. Most of the products are being recalled due to undeclared ingredients, which could pose allergy risks, or mix-ups (such as pieces of plastic in the product). … Read More
18 June HSE Campaign – Workplace Dust HSE Inspection Campaign HSE inspectors will, over the next few weeks, be focusing some of their time and effort on construction, woodworking and food manufacturing where occupational lung diseases, including in some cases occupational cancers, are more common. They will be asking what measures have been put in place to protect workers’ lungs from the … Read More
13 June (Yet another) fatal injury arsing from a fall from height Work at height can be very dangerous. As a result, the work needs to be planned and suitable control measures put in place to avoid what can only be termed as “wholly avoidable accidents” Two contractors have been fined after a worker suffers a fatal injury following a fragile roof fall during construction work. Wolverhampton … Read More
12 June Valero Energy UK fined £5 million after four people died in an oil explosion Valero Energy UK Ltd and B&A Contracts Ltd have been fined after an explosion killed four workers and seriously injured another at an oil refinery in Pembrokeshire in 2011. Dennis Riley, 52, Robert Broome, 48, Andrew Jenkins, 33, and Julie Jones, 54, died after a storage tank exploded at the site. Andrew Philips also sustained … Read More
11 June Failure to plan (a second article) and to do the basics – lifting operation Same start as the first article: Lifting operations must be planned. Not a difficult concept. Think about what is being lifted (the load) and what can go wrong, and make suitable arrangements. The construction firm BAM Nuttall has been fined more than £800,000 after a worker was struck by a large expanded polystyrene (EPS) block. … Read More
10 June Fire Safety – The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005: call for evidence The Government has opened a call for evidence that seeks views and evidence on the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 for England in workplaces and the parts used in common in multi-occupied residential buildings. If you wish to respond, note that this consultation closes at 11:45 pm on 31 July 2019. Consultation description The government is … Read More
29 May Death of a worker – using floor adhesive A supplier and a flooring company have both been sentenced following the death of a floor layer in London. Westminster Magistrates’ Court heard that on 4 September 2015, 30-year-old PT was found dead on the bathroom floor by the owner of the house in Mitcham. The adhesive used to fix the flooring contained a large … Read More
28 May 22 students died in a fire on 24 May … 22 students died in a fire on 24 May 2019. If this had occurred in the UK, this would have been huge news. Lots of underlying causes: lack of automatic fire detection lack of fire fighting equipment single wooden staircase inappropriate storage The fire occurred at a commercial complex (Takshashila Arcade) in Surat in India. … Read More