A demolition company and its director have been sentenced after a worker lost his arm when it was trapped between two 10 tonne steel girders.
Liverpool Crown Court heard how an employee of S Evans & Sons was injured when the managing director, who was operating machinery to stack the girders, dropped one of the girders onto the employee’s arms, resulting in amputation to the employee’s left arm and right hand.
An HSE investigation into the incident, which occurred on the 19 October 2015, found the company failed to apply appropriate control measures including ensuring the right equipment for the task was used.
Managing director Samuel Evans was directly involved in the incident and found personally responsible for both the choice of equipment and the manner in which the task was performed.
S Evans and Sons of Ditton Road, Widnes pleaded to safety breaches and was fined £150,000 and ordered to pay costs of £9,523.04.
Samuel Evans also pleaded guilty to safety breaches and was sentenced to 10 months imprisonment, suspended for two years, and ordered to complete 200 hours of unpaid work.
HSE inspector Rohan Lye said after the hearing: “If the company and its director had taken basic steps to decide how to do this routine task, and what control measures to use, they could have prevented this devastating incident resulting in an employee suffering life-changing injuries.”
Elsewhere an unregistered engineer has been jailed after carrying out unsafe work at a property in Bacton, Norfolk.
Norwich Crown Court heard how Christopher Johnson was contracted by the householder to install gas pipework, a gas cooker, gas hob and gas fire. The work took place in the summer of 2016. After several gas leaks occurred, the householder contacted Gas Safe Register, which inspected the work.
The installations were classified by Gas Safe Register as “Immediately Dangerous” and “At Risk”.
Johnson had previously been prosecuted for similar offences in 2012 and 2013. He also falsified a Gas Safe registration number on invoices for the work.
An investigation by the HSE alongside Gas Safe Register found Johnson was not registered or competent to do the work.
Christopher David Johnson of Kings Lynn, Norfolk, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 3 (2) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. He also pleaded guilty to breaching Regulations 3 (1) and 3 (3) of the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998.
Johnson was sentenced to 14 months in prison.
