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Practice meets perfect
May/June 2023 issue

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News

Bakkavor arm pays £2m for fatal bale fall

Open-access content Tuesday 2nd May 2017
From the archive:  Just so you know, this article is more than 3 years old.

Jacek Adamowicz, 29, worked at Hitchen Foods, which is owned by Bakkavor Group. On 4 February 2015 he was sweeping the storage yard when a stack of plastic bales collapsed on top of him.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that Bakkavor Foods had failed to plan how the bales should be safely stacked and stored, and had not provided formal training for employees who were responsible for carrying out the task.

It also said there was no safe system of work for staff exposed while the bales were being moved, and that monitoring in the area was lacking.

Bakkavor Foods, whose customers include Tesco, Sainsbury's, Waitrose and M&S, pleaded guilty to breaching s 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act. It was fined at Manchester Crown Court and ordered to pay costs of £32,595.

After the hearing HSE inspector Ian Betley said: "Bakkavor Foods fell far short of the required standard expected. Not only should proper planning have been carried out in relation to the storage and stacking of waste bales, but also a system of work subsequently put in place to mitigate both risks. The company failed on both of these counts with devastating consequences."

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 Worker fell in to meat separator

Monday 24th April 2017
The Beckett’s Foods employee was loading meat at the company’s Moat House site in Coventry on 11 May 2016. He fell into the machine and sustained serious injuries to his hand, which needed skin grafts. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found there was no safe system of work for using the meat separating equipment, which Beckett’s had not fitted with the appropriate level of guarding.  It pleaded guilty to breaching s 2(1) and 33(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act at Coventry Magistrates’ Court and was ordered to pay costs of £10,978.
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 *UPDATE* Bakkavor arm pays £2m for fatal bale fall

Thursday 11th May 2017
Jacek Adamowicz was a 29-year-old employee of Hitchen Foods, which is owned by the Bakkavor Group. He had been sweeping an aisle between two rows of waste plastic bales in the yard at 10.45am on 4 February 2015 when two bales collapsed. One of them, weighing 723 kg, fell 3 m and landed on him.
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 *UPDATE* Francis Crick Institute build fatality sees CMF fined £185k

Friday 5th May 2017
Richard Laco, 31, had been contracted by architectural metalwork specialist CMF to install six steel staircases at the biomedical research centre, which opened last year and where Laing O’Rourke was the principal contractor. Each staircase was made up of between 50 and 60 pieces and CMF operatives had already successfully installed two of them (units A and F).
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 DHL auditor crushed by 770 kg equipment load at JCB HQ

Monday 8th May 2017
An electric tug was towing the trolley through the yard at JCB’s headquarters in Rochester, Staffordshire on 16 October 2013. At the same time, a DHL employee was auditing incoming deliveries nearby.Stafford Crown Court was told that the trolley fell on its side and struck the worker, pinning him to a stillage. He sustained fractures and internal injuries.  The Health and Safety Executive’s (HSE) investigation found there was no system to segregate vehicles operating the warehouse from both DHL and JCB workers who were on foot.
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 South West Water sentenced over catchment operator's drowning

Monday 24th April 2017
Robert Geach, 54, was working on the sand filtration unit at the Falmouth Waste Water Treatment Works on 30 December 2013, Truro Crown Court was told, when he slipped and fell into the tank.South West Water dispatched a colleague to the site four and a half hours later, in response to its lone worker alert system. He found Geach floating face-down in the water.
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 Fatal limestone crush leaves Irish firm with £84k fine

Thursday 11th May 2017
Dundalk Circuit Criminal Court heard that Patrick Lambe was part of a four-man team that had been employed to clear limestone blockages in the preheater at Premier Periclase’s plant in Drogheda, County Louth when the incident occurred on 30 October 2014.
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