Page 17 - IOSH JanFeb24_Full LR

WASTE MANAGEMENT

BROKEN ISOLATOR before the repair work started and it TREE REMOVAL
was inadvertently switched on.
SWITCH COSTS Grzegorz became trapped between AROUND THE GLOBE COMPANY FINED
FIRM £260K AFTER a conveyor and a metal bridge RECORD A$2.25M
and sustained severe injuries. He
CRUSH INJURIES required 23 screws and two plates A tree management company has been
inside his body and has not been able

fined more than A$2m after a worker was
to return to work since. killed while hand-feeding a faulty
A London waste firm was recently woodchipper in Sydney.

taken to court after a worker was The investigation Samuela Cirivakayawa was
thrown onto a conveyor, trapped The isolator switch had been broken working for A1 Arbor Tree
against a metal bridge and crushed. and was therefore inoperative. Services at a school site in

The company also had no formal Lindfield in September 2019,
hand-feeding branches into
The incident maintenance arrangements for
the woodchipper.
Cappagh Public Works employed the machinery.
The worker was drawn into the in-feed
maintenance worker Grzegorz
hopper, which had been designed to be fed
Poreba, 48, to repair the mesh Sentencing
with a mechanical log loader and never by
of a hopper, which formed part Cappagh Public Works pleaded
hand, and into the internal disc drum.
of a waste-sorting machine, in guilty to breaching section 2(1) of the The court was told A1 Arbor Tree Services
Wimbledon, south London. But the Health and Safety at Work Act and did not complete a risk assessment of the

company failed to provide a suitable was fined £260,000 and ordered to equipment, which also had known defects.
means to isolate the machinery pay £4358 in prosecution costs. The judge concluded that the company
had failed to provide adequate information,
training or instruction to workers in relation
The fine imposed should underline to to safe operation of the woodchipper.

everyone in the waste industry that
the courts, and the HSE, take a failure DIRECTOR FINED
to ensure that maintenance work is AND WORKER
completed safely extremely seriously
JAILED FOR FATAL
SAFETY LAPSES

In Singapore, a concrete
manufacturer and its director

have been fined S$200,000
and S$125,000, and a worker
jailed for two months after a
construction worker died when he
was struck by a wheel loader.
In June 2021, Durairaj Ramesh, a
wheel loader operator, struck and killed
Subramaniyan Thiraviam, who was taking
photographs to stocktake construction
aggregates. Ramesh had not checked
cameras or mirrors while reversing.
Ramesh pleaded guilty under section
15(3A) of the Workplace Safety and Health
Act, for failing to keep a proper lookout.

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