By Nigel Mair
In this article I want to consider two of the accidents that have happened in the waste industry over the last few years. These are absolute tragedies for the individuals involved, which makes it even more important that we all reflect on the causes, learn any specific lessons and consider how they may relate to our own organisations.
Although the names of the organisations are part of the public record, I have removed them from this article.
Accident 1
A 32-year old family man was driving a tipper truck at a waste transfer site. He had just discharged a load at a transfer shed and moved the truck to another part of the site to secure its tailgate when he was struck from behind by the bucket of a shovel truck driven by another employee, sustaining severe injuries from which he never recovered.
The company pleaded guilty to breaching the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and were sentenced at the Old Bailey and fined £100,000, with £4,982 costs.
The HSE Principal Inspector had the following comment:
“The deceased’s family have lost a father, a husband and a son, and our sympathies are with them at this very sad time. The case shows everyone in the waste transfer industry the importance of planning for workplace transport and having safe systems of work in place. A one-way traffic system, the use of a banksman and designated pedestrian walkways, all of which were subsequently introduced by the company, may have prevented this fatality.”
The Judge added these comments:
“It is a very dangerous practice to drive a shovel truck, with the bucket raised a few feet off the ground, so that the driver’s forward vision is obscured. The penalty should reflect public concern at an unnecessary loss of life. Companies must be deterred from operating in a slack way.”
What lessons can we learn from this accident?
Unfortunately these circumstances are all too familiar and it highlights the need to really think about the way that you manage your sites. Transport and pedestrians are a very bad mix and you need to do everything you can to minimise the risks…if you read through the details again, how easily could that happen on your own site?
Make sure that you have thought about the issues by assessing the risks of vehicles on site, to include the way that you try and separate them from pedestrians. Having introduced robust safe systems of work you also need to think carefully about how these are communicated to everybody concerned and also, of course, how you monitor and enforce them.
Accident 2
A company has been prosecuted and fined for what the HSE described as ‘systemic failures’ in the way it operated a transfer station, that subsequently led to an employee of another organisation sustaining injury in a workplace transport accident.
Company X shared a workplace with Company Y, who had been engaged in some building work on the site, including the installation of dividing walls to create several bays, and it was during the works that the site agent (an employee of Company Y) was struck from behind by a wheeled loader as he walked down a service road, sustaining cuts, bruises and strains that were serious enough for him to be off work for several months.
The HSE said that Company X did not do everything it could to inform Company Y of the risks from the plant on site. This resulted in the accident.
Company X was found guilty of failing to look after, so far as is reasonably practicable, the H&S of people who they didn’t employ.
The HSE says the case underlines the need for companies sharing a workplace to co-operate with each other on risks and co-ordinate control measures.
The HSE Inspector said:
“This incident was not the result of the actions of an individual. Rather it is the result of systemic failures, which gave rise to the circumstances in which the incident occurred. Whilst Company Y also had a duty to ask about the risks to their employees, the greater burden was on Company Y. As the operator of the site it should be familiar with all the activities on site and the attendant risks to health and safety. In meeting its obligations under health and safety legislation, Company X should have ensured that information about those risks was communicated to Company Y. If that had been done it is unlikely that the employee would have been injured.
The site was busy with a considerable number of vehicle movements, which present well-known risks to safety. The loader driver was involved in a routine task. However the details of the task were not communicated to Company Y.
Employees from Company Y had visited the site prior to work commencing and developed a method statement and risk assessment for the job but were not made aware of the procedure for loading waste out of the waste compound. Therefore this was not reflected in the documents prepared. These documents were then passed to Company X for comment, but none was made. There was a lack of clarity over the project supervision that allowed the job to go ahead without adequate comment on the method statement and risk assessment. This allowed the risks associated with a routine activity to go ahead unchecked, leading to the incident in which a man was injured.”
What lessons can we learn from this accident?
Once again, this highlights a few important issues for you to consider. When I am on sites I often hear comments such as “he doesn’t work for us, so I don’t have to worry about him”. Unfortunately this is not true. It is your site, your operations and therefore, as set out in the accident, very much your responsibility.
You need to think carefully about the way that you manage third parties on your site, to include visitors, contractors and others. Have you made sure that you have told them clearly of the risks and that you have thought about how their work will impact on the site operations?
The two accidents set out the unfortunate consequences when things go wrong. A bit of forethought, planning and proactive management will hopefully ensure that you avoid the same pitfalls.

Nigel Mair is a WAMITAB assessor and verifier and runs the North West Regional Assessment Centre, delivering WAMITAB qualifications and other H&S, waste and environmental training.
This article was originally published in Issue 18 of The Skip