Had your breakfast yet? - Don't read on an empty stomach...

[Tony McC]

From the latest HSE newsletter....

"A Wales construction company has been fined £80,000 after one of its employees had his head crushed at a site in Gloucestershire.

HSE prosecuted Macob Administration Limited, based in Bridgend, after 23-year-old. Lance Taylor from Thornbury, Bristol, was killed while working on a construction site in Abbeymead, Gloucester on 11 February 2005. Mr Taylor was driving a mini digger ? which he was not qualified to operate - and unintentionally hit a lever as he leaned out of the cab window. The digging arm of the vehicle was raised, crushing his head between the cab and the arm. He suffered fatal injuries and was pronounced dead on site.

Macob Administration Ltd pleaded guilty to breaches under Regulation 9(1) and 28(a) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998. The company was fined £40,000 for each charge and ordered to pay costs of £29,798.14
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[Dave_L]

Oh god, that's terrible - and I can see how an inexperienced operator could just do that.

[Pablo]

It would be quite common to see an operator hangng out the front window to see the head of a trench as he dug it. Done it myself a few times but I know better now. Chances are that none of the bosses were aware that he was using it.

[lutonlagerlout]

A tragedy
i wonder if his family will see the 80k?
I went on some HSE courses and the way people manage to kill themselves on sites are endless,you can minimise risk,but where there is human fallibility there is always danger
LLL

[rab1]

its a shame when things like that happen but you would have thought someone would have asked to see his plant ticket.

[Tommy]

May be a case of fitting Operator Presence Controls on machines now, Not sitting in the seat - locks the hydraulics or similar.

[lutonlagerlout]

its something i have seen hundreds of times with digger drivers,driver leans out of cab to bottom out a trench
didn't realise that the jib could do this
LLL

[mickg]

i didn't think you could either Luton, I have done it loads of times myself when your 1 - 2 metres down and clearing the last bit in the corner of a footing but if you keep you head no higher than the inside of the cab roof then you could not get trapped

i can only assume he has put his head out of the window with the back of his head touching the front of the cab roof when the boom has been brought back into a vertical position he was crushed

or he has put his head out of the cab to the right hand side where the jib is offset and got trapped between the boom and the side of the cab

either way it just goes to show unless you have had proper training a terrible accident like this can and does happen

[flowjoe]

Back in the 80s we had one lad who had the top half of his overalls tied around his waste, when he leaned out of the cab they caught on the controls and the machine was spinning everywhere with him lay horizontal staring down at the tracks.

I did the same jumping out a a 1.5 tonne but luckily (for me, not the machine owner) the control lever popped out of its seating.

Training back then consisted of 15mins playing on the machine well away from anybody or anything.

[dig dug dan]

I hired a 13tonne kobelco once, and it had a brand new cab on it

When i asked why, the last hirer managed to rip the cab off using the bucket, whilst he was sitting in it! you would have thought he would have just let go of the controls!!



Edited By dig dug dan on 1264938328

[GB_Groundworks]

must have had an over sized bucket on or attachment because they are designed never to touch the cab obviously unless he was moving a big tree etc.

poor kid and his family i can't figure out how he did this, the geometry of the arm would make it difficult unless it was the lip of the cab roof, i thought at first he might have been working close to a building and slewed it into the buiding with his head out till i read it, we had a old priestman must be 20 years ago now with the old up and over front glass that protruded out the front 150mm when raised, dad had a big rock bucket on with new teeth curled right in went straight through the glass haha.

i never operate with my head out the cab, its silly and you loose all real control and touch with the machine.

its a lot better now with machines that lock out the controls, the old machines where dangerous on entry or exit.

young lad eager to please maybe and mini aren't that hard to operate to a basic degree its all the spacial awareness and positioning that comes with experience,

local hire company had 2k of damage to new 801.6 home owner doing their own footing backed it into a trench and rolled it backwards. crushed all the cab, must remember to put an advert up in there haha.

[lutonlagerlout]

my uncle used to work for luton council digging graves
anyway they had a 1.5 tonne machine for the deep ones
the yts lad was always after a go but as he had no training he wasnt allowed
anyway kenny was having his lunch and he heard the digger start up
"uh-oh" he thought,he ran out of the tea room to see the 16 yr old with a partially decomposed corpse impaled on the bucket
the lad never came back
you need a strong constitution to work in those places,kind of a gallows humour
LLL

[msh paving]

Just off subject did a drain run across church grave yard last winter, had archioligist on site as i was digging max dig 1m, had 4 heads,various torso's and sundry body bones out,she photo them put on the side and she chucked them in the bottom off backfill she assured us they was far to old to do anything about, was not nice MSH

[dig dug dan]

he ran out of the tea room to see the 16 yr old with a partially decomposed corpse impaled on the bucket

thats quite bad, for him, his boss, and the family of the remains!!
it would give me nightmares for sure!

[Dave_L]

Just off subject did a drain run across church grave yard last winter, had archioligist on site as i was digging max dig 1m, had 4 heads,various torso's and sundry body bones out,she photo them put on the side and she chucked them in the bottom off backfill she assured us they was far to old to do anything about, was not nice MSH

We've done exactly the same, not a pleasant experience I can tell you.

Not one that I would ever like to be put in ever again.