Construction Injury Narrative: Ironworker Falls 80 Feet Through Bent Plate Gap [2019]

Details

• Corporate Authors:
  Washington (State). Department of Labor and Industries
• Description:
  A 29-year-old ironworker was severely injured after falling through a bent plate gap and landing 80 feet below in a debris net. The ironworker's employer was a structural steel and precast concrete contractor. He had worked for his employer for over four years and he had been an ironworker for 10 years. The ironworker was a member of a "raising gang" crew of three. The crew was "shaking out" beams on the 18th floor of a high-rise building under construction. They were positioning the beams on the floor deck so a crane could lift them into place to be secured to the building structure. The ironworker and a coworker were guiding a beam on a shake out hook into place. The ironworker was at the end of the beam near the floor edge; the coworker was at the other end. There was not much room for the ironworker to maneuver between the beam and the steel cable guardrails. There was a floor gap 36 inches long by 4 inches wide by the standing column near him. As he stepped backward, he fell through the gap. He landed 80 feet below in a net designed to catch debris, not people. Coworkers rescued him from the net. He suffered numerous injuries, and still had not returned to work nearly a year after the incident. State investigators found that all the guardrail systems at the site were placed outside the edge of deck/floor in the locations where the bent plates had not been placed, allowing for a space employees could fall through. Company procedure was to place bent plates over these gaps later in the construction process after the beam/column weld connections were made and the welds inspected. Following the incident, the employer began corrective measures including: installing the bent plates as soon as structurally possible; decreasing the gap from 3 feet to 18 inches; moving the rail posts a few inches inward when possible; and wrapping cable rails around columns. Description provided by NIOSH
• Subjects:
  • Accidental Falls
  • Accidents
  • Environmental Exposure
  • Ferrous Compounds
  • Metal Workers
  • Occupational Health
  • Risk Assessment
  • Risk Factors
  • Safety
  • Staff Development
  More +
• Keywords:
  • Falls
  • Fall protection
  • Iron workers
  • Training
  • Safety
  • Safety equipment
  • Safety measures
  • Safety practices
  • Hazards
  • Exposure levels
  More +
• Series:
  Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Reports (FACE)
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Cooperative Agreement
• Genre:
  Report
• Place as Subject:
  OSHA Region 10 ; Washington
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  1
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20055712
• Citation:
  Olympia, WA: Washington State Department of Labor and Industries, 71-179-2019, 2019 Mar; :1
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2019
• Performing Organization:
  Washington State Department of Labor and Industries
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  20050701
• Source Full Name:
  Construction injury narrative: ironworker falls 80 feet through bent plate gap
• End Date:
  20260630
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/228916/cdc_228916_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 302.72 KB]
• Collection(s):
  Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation (FACE) Program ; National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:6579fc40de235a1c3fdb16756da67ff6cd4e155d33572906acafb2a94f53ab10edb481d6ef2fbc12f85d9ff6d9f9a6191599aa14bbbd0227eb9fb6be8888461e