Maintenance Engineer Dies after Falling Approximately 45 Feet from a Catwalk in California

Details

• Corporate Authors:
  California Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Program (CA/FACE) ; California. Department of Health Services
• Description:
  A 40-year-old male maintenance engineer (the victim) died after falling approximately 45 feet from a catwalk where he had been attempting to dislodge a piece of chain on a bulk-flow feeder elevator (conveyor). The victim had removed an inspection panel on a section of the conveyor in order to remove a piece of the conveyor chain. The piece of chain link had become lodged during an earlier attempt to repair the conveyor. The victim lost his balance falling backwards off the catwalk and striking a metal bar on his fall to the ground. There had been no recent safety inspection conducted in this area of the facility. There was no guardrail at this location and the victim had not been wearing a safety belt/harness or lanyard at the time of the incident. The CA/FACE investigator concluded that in order to prevent future similar occurrences employers should: 1. ensure that fall-protection equipment is provided and utilized by employees whenever work is performed from an elevation where the potential for a fall exists. 2. install guardrails in all work areas where a fall hazard exists. 3. routinely conduct scheduled and unscheduled worksite safety inspections.
• Subjects:
  Accident Prevention Accidents Accidents, Occupational Maintenance Occupational Health Personal Protective Equipment Safety Safety Management Workplace
• Keywords:
  Accident-analysis Accident-prevention Injuries Injury-prevention Maintenance-workers OSHA Region 9 Personal-protection Personal-protective-equipment Protective-equipment Protective-measures Safety-education Safety-equipment Safety-measures Safety-monitoring Traumatic-injuries Work-analysis Work-areas Work-operations Work-performance Work-practices

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• FACE - NIOSH and State:
  FACE ; Falls ; Hispanic ; Foreign Born Workers
• Series:
  Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Reports (FACE)
• Subseries:
  State
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.26616/NIOSHSFACE96CA005
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Cooperative Agreement
• Genre:
  Field Study
• Place as Subject:
  California ; OSHA Region 9
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  5 pdf pages
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20027087
• NTIS Accession Number:
  PB2007-112030
• 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 96CA005, 1996 Nov ; :1-5
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  1997
• Performing Organization:
  California Department of Health Services
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• NAICS and SIC Codes:
  31-33 - Manufacturing - (NAICS)
• Start Date:
  1991/09/30
• End Date:
  2006/08/31
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:13ff73fc434c30b0a761c1a12d44b9b18bf40886727631c9ea19c53a97dbba3f152d737dfc3c2df9f3252316957807cdcc73b07c884205c15406ad6a8a1598bc
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/169008/cdc_169008_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 28.07 KB ]