Safety Signs News

Shropshire firm prosecuted after worker suffers leg injuries

21st November 2012 | Health and Safety Signs

Posted by Ben Alexander

Elite Precast Concrete has been prosecuted after an employee suffered serious leg injuries as a result of being hit by a forklift truck.

Tomasz Kosmacz's duty was to remove excess concrete from moulds at the firm's Telford factory and was placing the substance into a bucket and onto the prongs of a forklift when the vehicle struck him, causing multiple foot fractures and a broken ankle.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that there was a written instruction in the factory, explaining that the bucket should be positioned on a pallet rather than the forks, but this had not been translated for Mr Kosmacz.

Mitcham skip company Rubbish Express is another organisation that has been fined by the HSE, after it pleaded guilty to two breaches of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974, leading to two £5,000 fines.

Elite Precast Concrete was fined £10,000 and ordered to pay £2,897 in costs.

HSE inspector Katharine Walker said: "Had the instruction requiring the use of a pallet to move the waste been translated into Polish and effectively communicated to the workers, Mr Kosmacz would not have had to endure these painful injuries." ADNFCR-2754-ID-801492005-ADNFCR