At a site in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire a worker received a fatal crush injury when they were working on a piece of machinery. The company involved was IFG Drake Ltd.
This case was heard in Leeds Crown Court. Mr Javeed Ghaffar was removing a lap from around the rollers in a synthetic fibre manufacturing machine. The reason for removing the ‘lap’ was because fibres were stuck to the rollers and as a consequence they began to wrap around the machine.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigated this case and reported that adequate guarding was not installed on the machine. This resulted in workers needing to deal with any issues that occurred by reaching around the inadequate guarding that was in place. The HSE found that this practice was happening at IFG Drake Ltd.
Pleading guilty IFG Drake Ltd were issued with a £366,850 and ordered to pay £23,993 in costs.
John Boyle (HSE Inspector) made the following statement after the hearing concluded ‘This was a tragic and wholly avoidable incident, caused by the failure of the company to provide adequate guarding against dangerous parts of the machine. Companies should be aware that HSE will not hesitate to take appropriate enforcement action against those that fall below the required standards’.
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