Waste Paper Company Fined After Worker’s Horrific Death

Worker who was crushed in a compactor had no safe way of clearing blockages

Yet another case of a preventable death.  Waste paper management company RRS London was fined £250,000 following the death of one of it’s employees, who fell into a bailing machine whilst trying to clear a blockage in the hopper.  IOSH Magazine reported that  it was “most likley” the worker fell down the baling machine’s hopper and into the compactor chamber while clearing material that had blocked the hopper. “Falling into the chamber initiated the compaction sequence,”

No safe system of work, no fall arrest system, the method of clearing blockages had been adopted by other workers at the site.  The company pleaded guilty to a charge of breaching s2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

If a risk assessment had been carried out correctly, this easily foreseeable risk of significant injury or death must have been identified and steps taken to remove the risk.  Simply following the rules which have been laid down for years would have avoided this needless death.

Read the IOSH article here