05.09.2008

£15,000 fine for lift accident

Construction company William Birch & Sons of Link Road Court, Osbaldwick has been fined £12,500 plus £2,500 in costs and £15 victim surcharge for an accident in which two men were thrown out of the basket of a 3.5 tonne truck mounted aerial lift, leaving one man, Chris Cook, 44, in a comma for a month.

The accident happened in Bootham road York in August 2007, after a truck clipped the knuckle of the Niftylift truck mount which was extended out into the road. The boom swing 180 degrees and flung both men to the ground. Neither were wearing a harness.

The men were working on the brickwork at the first-floor level and had made no attempt to cordon-off the working area.

An off-duty police officer walking along Bootham road shortly before the crash were so appalled by the lack of cones and warning bollards round the aerial lift that he described it to investigators as “an accident waiting to happen”.

Another witness had also seen a van swerve to avoid the lifts boom knuckle causing it to career onto the wrong side of the road narrowly missing another vehicle.
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Paul Robinson, prosecuting for the Health and Safety Executive. Said: “Had the vehicle’s owners, William Birch & Sons, provided its operator with a checklist of safety procedures to carry out, including a risk assessment, the accident could have been prevented.”

William Birch, pleaded guilty to not ensuring Cook’s safety, its managing director Chris Birch said afterwards: “This has been a deeply regrettable incident for a long-established family business with an otherwise excellent safety record. Lessons have been learned to ensure that this will not happen again.”

The company said it had provided training for the lift operator, Karl Thackrah, 37, and provided safety equipment to control traffic round the vehicle.

Thackrah of Pottery Lane, York, denied an offence of not ensuring Cook’s safety and elected trial by jury. His case was adjourned for committal proceedings.


Vertikal Comment

This is an interesting case, on the one hand it is very clear that neither the operator or the tradesman had a clue regarding basic safety measures. One has to believe that anyone with an ounce of common sense would see that sticking part of the lifts boom out into traffic was a hazard.

One would have also hoped that the need for a harness would have been mildly self evident. It will be interesting to see if the operator goes to trial and if so what the jury makes of it.