09.09.2016

Crane to the rescue

If you are having a bad Friday, spare a thought for the operator that turned his truck mounted lift over today in the London area.

The information we have is vague, but the incident qualifies as a Death Wish anyway, the platform is set up in the road and is short rigged to the rear – nothing wrong with that - and the machine appears to well cordoned off. However the outriggers on the load bearing side of the machine appear to have been set up on the pavement/sidewalk without outrigger mats.

The lift, which is owned by rental company Blade, has overturned onto the roof of an industrial unit. We understand that no one was serious injured in the incident.
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The overturned truck mounted lift

What caused the overturn is hard to say, the way the machine is positioned suggests that the rear outrigger punched through the ground surface – but the photo we have been sent does not show the machine from that side. And the front outriggers are still in contact with the ground. It looks as though the rear jacks might have mats under them, in which case perhaps the rear outriggers lost pressure? It is anyone's guess and conjecture is not helping. We also do not know if this unit was out with an operator - or on self drive - hopefully the latter.

A crane from Lee Lifting, which is based in Feltham near Heathrow, Middlesex, arrived on scene to recover the stricken machine. We will update this item if and when we learn more. In the meantime have a safe weekend.
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A mobile crane comes to the rescue, and he is using mats

UPDATE

Following an in house investigation into this incident Blade Access has issue the following statement:

"Official Statement relating ground stability incident with a Blade Access Truck Mounted Platform on 9th September 2016

Further to the incident on the 9th September 2016 where a Blade Access Truck Mounted Platform lost ground stability, Blade Access would like to issue the following statement in response to the recent incident publication.
Whilst there has been speculation and active social media input, we have remained open minded and professionally completed our own internal investigations before making any comment. Now our investigation is completed, we can make the following comments surrounding the incident."

"A 45 metre Truck Mounted Platform was deployed to site under a rehire contract and was supplied complete with a trained operator who has served with Blade since 20th February 2012 in the capacity of Access Platform Operator. The Operator in question has had no previous near misses or incidents/accidents and has held an exemplary safety record with our company."

"It was whilst working at height, the rear nearside stabiliser punctured the surface of the footpath which caused the Platform Boom to drop around 10cm and come to rest of the building roof. We now know the cause of this was due to a lack of suitable ground protection being used. Fortunately, no injuries were sustained and all personnel managed to safely return to ground. The platform was recovered with the use of a Mobile Crane and under the supervision of the Platform manufacturers UK service provider. The Platform is now undergoing a thorough inspection by the same UK main dealer service provider."

"During our investigation and in agreement with the Platform Operator, we established that no other mitigating circumstances had affected the Operators judgement on the day, he simply “thought it would be ok” not to deploy outrigger pads despite this being against all his professional training and experience. The operator in his own words stated he doesn’t know why he didn’t deploy even the standard outrigger pads for the platform and is deeply regretful for this error of judgement. A review of previous site attendances/audits confirmed the operator had never made this mistake previously."

"Whilst it is disappointing that such an incident has occurred with one of our rental platforms, it is crucial that any lessons or improvements which can be learned from such events is not only communicated with our own business but the industry. As such and in addition to our findings, Blade Access has decided that further Specific Point Loading Education on the reasons why additional ground protection is required would be beneficial to professional platform operators in the industry."

"Blade will now write this additional training module and include it as standard within our ‘Platform Operator Training Programme’ and it will be in addition to the existing training all our Platform Operators receive relating to ground protection and platform stabilisation. The new module will be communicated every 6 months to all employees."

"Although it has been completely out of character for the Operator of the Platform not to deploy outrigger pads, as a precautionary measure he has been removed from Platform Operation until further training has been completed."