22.04.2008

Telehandler accident costs £20k

Solihull-based Rysman Construction, was fined by £18,000 plus $1,600 of costs this week following an accident in which a telehandler it had rented, tipped over and landed in the road. The company was building three blocks of apartments on the site in Sutton Coldfield.

Rysman was fined for failing to ensure the safety of members of the public an employee of the company had tried to lift a piece of canopy using a telehandler in spite of not being formally qualified to operate it.

Due to the uneven ground the telehandler was pulled on its side, sending its 12 metre boom and 70 kg of canopy crashing through protective fencing and into the neighbouring road.
The operator received minor injuries and concussion and was taken to hospital, but was later discharged. Thankfully no passers-by were injured during the incident.

HSE Prosecuting Inspector Mike Ford told Sutton Coldfield Magistrates' Court: "The boom fell across Rectory Road, which was blocked until about ten o'clock in the evening."

A fully trained operator was controlling the machine but had temporarily left his vehicle to go to the toilet. During this time the untrained employee had entered and tried to move the canopy.

Of a maximum penalty of £20,000, Rysman was fined £18,000 for breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. The company was ordered to pay this within the next 28 days, along with £1,590 in costs.

A second charge, that the employee in question did not receive adequate training, was dropped.

Judge Dilloway, said: "We have listened to what everyone has said and we feel that there is mitigation. We have given credit to the company for their early guilty plea and the fact that they cooperated."

Ford added: "It shows that even a company with a previously good health and safety record, normally working to sound practices, can find itself in court for not actively monitoring the training and competence of operators of machinery and controlling who uses such machinery."

"In this case the consequences, as the site was adjacent to a busy road, could have been horrific."