Metalcorp Recyclers Pty Limited

Incident description:

On 31 December 2007 a 28 year old worker sustained fatal injuries when a beam fell and crushed him while he was undertaking strip down maintenance work on a metal shredder.

The court found the defendant, Metalcorp Recyclers Pty Limited, held obligations under s.28 of the Workplace Health and Safety Act 1995 being an employer conducting a scrap metal recycling business at Hemmant.

The investigation findings presented to the court alleged the defendant was undertaking a shutdown to allow maintenance work on various items of plant within its workplace. It engaged a number of labour hire workers, including the fatally injured worker. The worker, a second year apprentice welder, had been on site for approximately 13 weeks prior to the incident.

The investigation findings presented to the court revealed:

• the defendant owned the metal shredding equipment
• the manufacturing manual supplied with the plant to the defendant did not identify that the steel beam was not attached to a drum roller and needed to be supported if work was to be performed on it
• two workers were instructed to undertake work on the beam
• the workers were not given any instructions on how to remove the beam and were not told that it was unsupported
• the worker was cutting bolts underneath the beam
• the beam fell and the worker received fatal crush injuries
• the defendant was not expecting the two workers to be performing work on the beam, as they had engaged another contractor to perform this work
• the system the external maintenance contractor had proposed to use would not have exposed workers to a similar risk of crush injury
• the defendant's maintenance manager was on site and aware that the two workers were working in the vicinity of the beam, but he did not direct the work to stop.

Court result:

The defendant pleaded guilty in the Brisbane Central Industrial Magistrates Court on 7 December 2010 to breaching s.24(1) of the Workplace Health and Safety Act 1995, having failed to meet its workplace health and safety obligation and was sentenced with no conviction recorded.

Industrial Magistrate Mr. John Costello fined the defendant $120 000 and ordered costs totalling $4917.40.

In reaching a decision the industrial magistrate acknowledged the defendant failed to ensure the health and safety of the worker.

In deciding the penalty imposed, Industrial Magistrate Costello took into account the defendant had not been prosecuted previously for any workplace health and safety breach and cooperated with the investigation.

Considerations for prevention:

(Commentary under this heading is not part of the Court's decision.)

When working in the metal recycling and metal fabrication industry where there is exposure to risks whilst undertaking maintenance work on plant, obligation holders should apply a risk management approach to ensure the selection of suitable control measures.

Risk management involves:

• identifying the hazards
• evaluating the consequences and likelihood of harm that may result from the hazard
• deciding and implementing control measures to prevent or minimise the level of the risk from the hazard
• monitoring the effectiveness of the control measures to ensure they remain working correctly.

Obligation holders should ensure that a proper risk assessment is conducted, specifically with respect to maintenance to be performed on individual items of industrial plant. They must ensure that a safe work procedure is developed and effectively communicated to suitably qualified staff, who are to undertake and supervise such work.

Visit the Workplace Health and Safety Queensland website for more information on:

• Plant, machinery and equipment
• Training staff and using control measures to manage risks associated with workplace hazards
• Health and safety information for retail and wholesale
• Plant Code of Practice 2005
• Risk Management Code of Practice 2007
• Workplace Health and Safety Act 1995.