01.10.2013

Walking the plank

Spotted in Scotland last week, one of the craziest and most dangerous uses for a scissor lift we have seen in some time.

The story is best told in the words of our reader who sent in the follow report:

“This machine was spotted last week in George Street, Paisley by our sales manager. He was doing a site survey for a national company when he and our client observed these ‘professionals’ working on a roof in a very busy town centre.”
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Walking the plank at height

“They were working off a Liftlux machine which bore stickers of Whellock from Milton Keynes. However, I am led to believe that Whellock sold this particular unit on to someone else some time ago. The list of non conformities is endless, even the machine selection is all wrong.”

“As you can see there are a number of individuals clambering about on the roof, removing roof tiles. Their only access and egress from the machine is via a scaffold plank perched between the hand rail and edge of the roof. One worker has been nominated to ferry the roof tiles back and forth along the plank, with the cross wind blowing he was repeatedly blown off balance, virtually every trip across, several times our man thought he was a goner, and said it was heart stopping stuff! As you can probably tell from the photo this chap looks absolutely terrified.”
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One man hands roof tiles to another from the plank

“I suspect that this job is being carried out by a real cowboy outfit. I suspect that these guys have just pitched up and got stuck in. There appears to be no authorised lane closure as school children are clearly at risk from any falling roof slates. Our sales manager decided not to intervene, for fear of distracting the workers and possibly causing a fall. A call was made to the HSE, the outcome of which is unknown. I would suspect that these chancers would give false names, no one will be directly in charge on site and they will disappear as quickly as they popped up.”
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The man on the plank looks decidedly nervous and rightly so

What more can we add? The fact is that many people will know which company this is, and it is clearly one that the safety authorities should follow up firmly. Hopefully any HSE inspectors reading this bulletin will pass this on to those responsible for the area.

A definite one for our Death Wish series.