Prosecutions

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) recently prosecuted a maintenance company from South Yorkshire for breaching section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act over the incident in January 2008. The company pleaded guilty to the charge and was fined £10,000 and ordered to pay £4,085 costs at Sheffield Crown Court.

The court heard that an employee of the company from Barnsley, aged 29 at the time of the accident, had been polishing a metal component on a lathe, when his hands became caught and were pulled into the machine. He had been using an emery cloth and wearing gloves, entangling him further into the machine, which was rotating at 1,200 revolutions per minute.

Although the employee managed to free his hands from the gloves, he suffered serious injuries to his left hand, including three broken metatarsal bones, muscle damage and severe bruising, as well as muscle injuries and bruising to his right hand.

The HSE conducting an investigation as a result of the accident which revealed that the company had neither carried out the necessary risk assessments, nor had they implemented any safe systems of work to prevent such an incident. The employee had been employed by the company as a fitter in October 2007 but had no experience of operating metal working lathes and was not given the appropriate instruction or cleaning tools to carry out the task.

The employee is still unable to clench his left fist or lift heavy items, which has affected his career.