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Nelson, Lancashire · Warrington Magistrates' Court
On 24 October 2024 a welder/fabricator at the company's factory at Malvern Mill, Nelson, was working alone, holding the larger side of a 133kg stainless steel hopper in the air while the smaller side rested on a desk. The hopper slipped on the smooth desk and came down onto his hand. HSE found the company had not carried out a risk assessment for the task and had no safe system of work, and that a near-identical incident had happened in the days before.
Injuries: The worker suffered a crush injury to the hand and the partial loss of his right thumb.
Regulation 4(1) of the Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992
“failed in its duty to properly plan this task...”
Risk assess every heavy manual handling task, give workers a clear safe way to do it, and act straight away when a near miss shows the method is not safe.
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