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Temporary worker fatally crushed: paper bales topple at recycling plant.

Anonymous

FACE Facts 1995 Jan; 1(1):1

http://www.mass.gov/eohhs/docs/dph/occupational-health/paper-bales.pdf

20034286

The victim, an 18-year-old Hispanic male, and co-worker were hired as temporary laborers by a cleaning service and assigned to a paper recycling plant. The company recycled and packaged paper. It had been in buesiness for over four years. Waste paper was collected, separated, bound, and stacked in bales on site. The company had eight to ten regular employees, and routineIy contracted the cleaning serves to provide a crew of three or for laborers. The company did not employ a designated safety person or have written safety policies or procedures. Neither the company nor the cleaning service provided safety training for the temporay employees. The incident occurred 90 minutes into the victim's first day at the plant. He and two co-workers were alone in the main facility, sweeping in the vicinity of the plant waste-paper conveyor and stacked paper bales. The paper bales were stacked 25 feet deep and 18 feet (seven bales) high along the side of the building. Without warning, four of the bales of wire-bound waste paper fell 18 feet onto the victim and one of his co-workers. The bales weighed approximately 1,300 pounds and measured approximateIy four feet by two and a half feet by five feet each. The victim suffered massive crushing injuries to the upper body and head and was pronounced dead at the scene. The co-worker was airlifted to a regional hospital here he survived the acute trauma.

Accident-analysis; Accident-prevention; Injury-prevention; Protective-measures; Warehousing; Industrial-equipment; Industrial-safety; Training; Safety-research; Materials-storage

Occupational Health Surveillance Program, Massachusetts Department of Public Health, 250 Washington Street, Boston, Massachusetts 02108

19950101

Newsletter

Cooperative Agreement

1995

Cooperative-Agreement-Number-U60-CCU-108704

1

Fatality Investigation Report: FACE Facts

MA

Massachusetts Department of Public Health