Fined due to employees fall from telehandler
An agricultural services company was fined following an incident in which two workers were injured during construction work at a farm in Goxill, north Lincolnshire.
The court heard that two workers fell approximately three metres and received serious injuries when the mobile work platform they were working in failed.
The two workers were fixing roof beams from inside a raised man riding basket fitted to a forklift telehandler truck when the basket attachment failed, and fell along with the workers around three metres to the ground below, at which point both men suffered broken bones and internal injuries.
The immediate cause of the accident was that the basket had not been secured correctly to the forks of the telehandler, in addition to the fact that the type of equipment being used was not suitable for this high risk work.
The company had failed to ensure the safety of its employees, in that the work at height activities were not properly planned, appropriately supervised, or carried out in a safe manner. In particular the company had failed to provide appropriate equipment for work at height.
The company was fined £5000 with £10,147 in costs after pleading guilty to breaching Regulation 4 of the Work at Height Regulations 2005.