Warehouse worker injury highlights risk of workplace accidents

Published on Dec 2

A worker at a textile retailer was injured after falling from an unguarded platform onto the concrete floor at the company’s warehouse. The man suffered from a broken leg from the fall and then his ankle was crushed after a board fell onto it. He also received bad bruising to his face.

The company was fined £12,000 and ordered to pay £3,056 in costs, after it was found that workers had no supervision or training and no protection against falling from heights of up to 30 feet. They had not been given specialist equipment and the ladders that were used were not suitable and were not fixed.

A similar event occurred last year. A company based in Tipton was fined £10,000 and paid £7,561 costs after one of their workers fell from a storage unit. The worker had been assembling the storage unit when he fell 10 feet. He suffered from broken ribs and head injuries. There was no edge protection to prevent him from falling. A HSE inspector said “While the injuries suffered were serious, they could have been much worse. A fall from this kind of height can be fatal.” It was decided by the court that sufficient precautions were not taken to prevent workplace accidents.

Falls from a height are one of the main causes of workplace accidents across all industries but the warehouse holds other dangers too. A company in Bolton was fined £12,500 and paid £4,230 in costs after one of its workers was hit by a forklift truck. The worker was kneeling down, measuring empty pallets when the truck ran over his right leg and trapped his foot. He broke three toes, fractured several bones in his foot and suffered damage to his skin, muscle and tissue. He had trouble walking for more than eighteen months after his injuries. The court found that the company had been negligent because stock was left in the aisles, which narrowed the route for the truck to pass through and there was no separate pathway for pedestrians.

Where vehicles and workers are in the same building, there should be measures in place to ensure that both can move about separately and safely. In fact, Regulation 17 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 stipulates that: “Every workplace shall be organised in such a way that pedestrians and vehicles can circulate in a safe manner.”

Other hazards can include slips and trips, manual lifting and the collapse of storage systems. Storage areas should be carefully planned and regularly inspected. Pallets or shelves should be loaded in a way that ensures stability and should not be overloaded.

In 2007/08, there were over 10,000 workplace accidents reported to HSE in the storage, warehousing and road haulage industries. Over 1700 of these accidents were major injuries, including fractures and amputations. The number of accidents that has occurred is a clear indication that employers need to be taking more precautions to ensure the safety of their workers.