Worker injured in four-foot fall, highlighting importance of NEBOSH courses

Category: NEBOSH National General Certificate
Wednesday 17th of February 2010

A company has been fined following an incident in which a worker fell four feet and suffered serious injuries.

NEBOSH course students may already be aware that falls at work are being targeted in the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Shattered Lives scheme, in an attempt to lower the number of people injured by slips in work from 10,000 in 2008-09.

The employee was cleaning the side of a flour hopper at Tregroes Waffle Bakery factory in Llandysul, west Wales, when she fell from a structural girder she was using for access.

She fell four feet and sustained a fractured rib, a cut to her leg and bruising. If she had not landed on a bulk container below, she would have fallen twice as far.

The company was fined £1,750 and ordered to pay costs by Llanelli Magistrates' Court

HSE inspector Scott McKinnon said that nothing had been put in place to stop the employee from falling, which had exposed her to serious risks.

He added: "Many serious - and sometimes fatal - injures are caused by falls from distances below head height."

Posted by Sam Lowther

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