Municipal Electrician Dies after Falling from the Raised Bucket of a Vehicle-mounted Aerial Lift That Was Struck by a Tractor-trailer – Massachusetts

Details

• Personal Author:
  Davis, Letitia ; Fiore, Michael A.
• Corporate Authors:
  Massachusetts Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Project (Massachusetts FACE) ; Massachusetts. Department of Public Health
• Description:
  On October 18, 2011 a 58-year-old male municipal maintenance technician/electrician (victim) was fatally injured when he fell from a vehicle-mounted aerial lift's raised bucket. The victim and two co-workers were repairing a faulty cantilevered traffic signal at a four-way intersection. The victim was inside the raised bucket accessing the traffic light when a tractor-trailer driving through the intersection struck the raised bucket. The victim was ejected out of the bucket and fell approximately seventeen feet to the roadway below. A call was placed for Emergency Medical Services (EMS) by the co-workers. Within minutes EMS and the local police arrived at the incident location and the victim was transported to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead. The Massachusetts FACE Program concluded that to prevent similar occurrences in the future, municipalities should: 1. Ensure that fall protection is used when working from an aerial lift truck's raised bucket/platform
  
  2. Ensure that when performing work in roadways that work zones are set up, at a minimum, in accordance with the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD), Part 6, developed by the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration
  
  3. Ensure that employees' exposure to moving traffic is minimized when working in and around roadways by developing temporary traffic control plans, including never allowing traffic to pass underneath raised aerial lift buckets/platforms
  
  4. Provide and ensure that employees wear the appropriate personal protective equipment, including American National Standard Institute (ANSI) compliant high visibility safety apparel, when working along roadways
  
  5. Provide work zone safety training for all employees who will be required to complete tasks while in proximity to roadways
  
  6. Ensure that each department develops, implements, and enforces a comprehensive health and safety program that includes hazard recognition and avoidance of unsafe conditions
  
  7. Provide work environments that, at a minimum, meet all relevant Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regulations and industry accepted standards of practice. In addition manufacturers of aerial lifts and municipalities should consider using contrasting colors and installing strobe lights along the booms of aerial lifts.
  
  
• Subjects:
  Accident Prevention Accidents Accidents, Occupational Occupational Health Personal Protective Equipment Safety Safety Management Staff Development Workplace
• Keywords:
  Accident-analysis Accident-potential Accident-prevention Injuries Injury-prevention OSHA Region 1 Personal-protection Personal-protective-equipment Safety-education Safety-measures Safety-practices Safety-programs Training Traumatic-injuries Warning-devices Warning-signs Warning-systems Work-environment Work-operations

  More +
• FACE - NIOSH and State:
  FACE ; Falls ; Motor Vehicles
• Series:
  Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Reports (FACE)
• Subseries:
  State
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.26616/NIOSHSFACE11MA043
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Cooperative Agreement
• Genre:
  Field Study
• Place as Subject:
  Massachusetts ; OSHA Region 1
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  1-13
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20044662
• NTIS Accession Number:
  PB2014-107900
• Citation:
  Morgantown, WV: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, FACE 11MA043, 2012 Oct ; :1-13
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2013
• Performing Organization:
  Massachusetts State Department of Public Health
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• NAICS and SIC Codes:
  23 - Construction - (NAICS)
• Start Date:
  2005/07/01
• End Date:
  2026/06/30
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:41ea291bb9e8aa4fc2f69d95d018c28b525aad8a5202ddefc322d58ed93c63c862d07398fc8a1422e61766cb8823cb27a11b684cfbf084acbea3ec6971fec9c1
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/165139/cdc_165139_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 479.36 KB ]