Temporary Worker Fatally Crushed: Paper Bales Topple at Recycling Plant

Details

• Description:
  The victim, an 18-year-old Hispanic male, and co-worker were hired as temporary laborers by a cleaning service and assigned to a paper recycling plant. The company recycled and packaged paper. It had been in business for over four years. Waste paper was collected, separated, bound, and stacked in bales on site. The company had eight to ten regular employees, and routinely contracted the cleaning serves to provide a crew of three or for laborers. The company did not employ a designated safety person or have written safety policies or procedures. Neither the company nor the cleaning service provided safety training for the temporary employees. The incident occurred 90 minutes into the victim's first day at the plant. He and two co-workers were alone in the main facility, sweeping in the vicinity of the plant waste-paper conveyor and stacked paper bales. The paper bales were stacked 25 feet deep and 18 feet (seven bales) high along the side of the building. Without warning, four of the bales of wire-bound waste paper fell 18 feet onto the victim and one of his co-workers. The bales weighed approximately 1,300 pounds and measured approximately four feet by two and a half feet by five feet each. The victim suffered massive crushing injuries to the upper body and head and was pronounced dead at the scene. The co-worker was airlifted to a regional hospital here he survived the acute trauma. Description provided by NIOSH
• Subjects:
  • Accident Prevention
  • Accidents
  • Accidents, Occupational
  • Manufacturing and Industrial Facilities
  • Occupational Health
  • Safety
  • Staff Development
• Keywords:
  • Accident analysis
  • Accident prevention
  • Injury prevention
  • Protective measures
  • Warehousing
  • Industrial equipment
  • Industrial safety
  • Training
  • Materials storage
• Series:
  Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Reports (FACE)
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Cooperative Agreement
• Genre:
  Newsletter
• 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 pdf page
• Volume:
  1
• Issue:
  1
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20034286 ; nn:20034287
• Citation:
  FACE Facts 1995 Jan; 1(1):1
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  1995
• Performing Organization:
  Massachusetts Department of Public Health
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  19920930
• End Date:
  20060831
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/228607/cdc_228607_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 340.78 KB]
• Collection(s):
  Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation (FACE) Program ; National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:4522dc7d009b911f02271e5062d57185d71a6f2e35322ceeea69f234ed11f8e8b0788a5c3bb584224e96afbe71d70b22198970f91865cf924ac29f13d39b199c