Cleanzine: your weekly cleaning and hygiene industry newsletter 18th April 2024 Issue no. 1110

Your industry news - first

The original and best - for over 20 years!

We strongly recommend viewing Cleanzine full size in your web browser. Click our masthead above to visit our website version.

Road sweeper refuel cost worker his life

A waste management and plant hire company in Derbyshire has been fined after a worker was fatally crushed between two vehicles while refuelling.

Derby Crown Court heard how 39-year-old Matthew Lambert was refuelling his road sweeper at the yard of Leedale.

The refuelling point on the vehicle was at the rear, and it was while he was refuelling that a tipper lorry reversed into him. Matthew was crushed between the two vehicles and died of catastrophic head injuries.

An investigation by the Health & Safety Executive into the incident, which occurred in November 2013, found there were no marked or identified vehicle and pedestrian routes. There were no rules or control of reversing manoeuvres, and the lighting at the site was poor and below the required standard.

Leedale, of Heage Road Industrial Estate, Heage Road, Ripley, Derbyshire, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health & Safety at Work etc Act 1974, and was fined £300,000 and ordered to pay costs of £50,737.

For information on workplace transport visit: www.hse.gov.uk

2nd June 2016