Steel firm fined after worker crushed

Date:

3 March 2011

Release No:

HSE/EM/158/11

Tata Steel Ltd has been fined £20,000 after a worker sustained serious crush injuries while fixing a packing machine at Corby Steel Works, Northamptonshire.

During the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) prosecution, Northampton Crown Court heard that on 23 October 2008, the 34 year old employee, who does not wish to be named, was called to the machinery enclosure to repair a broken strapping machine which had brought production on a line at the Weldon Road site to a halt.

After undertaking the repair the man, who with other employees was working inside the machinery enclosure, noticed another maintenance matter on an adjacent packing machine. While they were attending to this the second machine started up and completed its movement cycle, crushing him between a large electromagnet and fixed parts of the machine structure.

He suffered serious chest and abdominal crush injuries including a number of broken bones. Happily, he made a good recovery and several months later returned to his job at the Works. Other employees who were working in the machinery enclosure escaped injury.

The HSE investigation found the company did not have effective guarding around the machines and despite having a written procedure to ensure machines remained isolated until maintenance work was complete, this was not implemented.

HSE inspector Roger Amery, who led the investigation said:

"This totally avoidable incident could easily have ended in tragedy. The worker was extremely fortunate to have survived and his colleagues were lucky to escape unharmed.

"Employers need to understand how vital effective guarding is on these complex and powerful machines that can quickly inflict serious or fatal injuries.

"When maintenance is undertaken, robust isolation procedures need to be kept in place until work has been completed and employees are clear of any danger.

"Many major injuries such as those sustained in this particular incident, and the fatalities that happen during maintenance each year, are wholly avoidable and most definitely not a price worth paying for operating a manufacturing business."

Tata Steel Limited, which at the time of the incident was known as Corus UK Limited, of Millbank, London, was today fined £20,000 and ordered to pay £24,052 costs, at Northampton Crown Court after earlier pleading guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health & Safety at Work etc Act 1974.

Notes to editors

1. The Health and Safety Executive is Britain's national regulator for workplace health and safety. It aims to reduce work-related death, injury and ill health. It does so through research, information and advice; promoting training; new or revised regulations and codes of practice; and working with local authority partners by inspection, investigation and enforcement. www.hse.gov.uk
2. Section 2 (1) of the Health & Safety at Work etc Act 1974 states: "It shall be the duty of every employer to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all his employees."

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