Balfour Beatty fined after rail worker receives electric shock
A major rail project organisation has been fined after a worker suffered serious burns when he made contact with overhead lines carrying 25,000 volts.
The incident occurred in North West London during March 2011. Workers were working at height on cherry pickers while moving along the rack and installing cables alongside an existing overhead line. Despite the work being undertaken, one of the high voltage overhead lines had not been isolated. Workers at the site were unaware of this; when a worker was checking the distance between the new cable and the overhead wire, he made contact with the live wire. The injured worker suffered 45% burns and required extensive skin grafts.
An investigation by ORR found that the work had not been properly planned and sufficient instruction had not been provided to workers regarding the risks associated with the work. The court also heard there was poor communication between the planning and construction teams, meaning that Balfour Beatty had not requested the relevant sections of overhead wire were switched off.
Balfour Beatty Rail Projects Ltd was fined £350,000 and ordered to pay costs of £50,000.
Balfour Beatty was prosecuted for breaching Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, which requires that employers ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that persons not in his employment who may be affected are not exposed to risks to their health or safety.
Rolls Royce fined for loss of a radioactive source
A subsidiary of Rolls Royce has been fined after the company lost a Ytterbium-169 radioactive source for five hours. The source was lost during radiography operations at the company’s site in Derby on 3 March 2011.
On the day of the incident the source became detached from its holder within a radiography enclosure, leading to it ending up inside the component being tested. Safety measures within the enclosure and radiographer did not identify the loss of the source.
The source was later identified by welders working on the component. The object was removed and radiographers on the next shift ultimately identified the source after handling it. The room was cleared, the source recovered and the area made safe.
The loss of the source lead to a number of workers receiving high levels of exposure to ionising radiation, including that up to 32 times the relevant statutory dose limit for hands.
Rolls Royce Marine Power Operations Ltd was fined £200,000 and ordered to pay costs of £176,500. The company was fined for breaches of the following legislation:
- Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974, which requires that employers ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all their employees;
- Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974, which requires that employers conduct their undertakings in a way such that persons not in their employment who may be affected thereby are not thereby exposed to risks to their health or safety;
- Regulation 3(1)(a) of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, which requires that employers make a suitable and sufficient assessment of (a)the risks to the health and safety of his employees to which they are exposed whilst they are at work; and (b) the risks to the health and safety of persons not in his employment arising out of or in connection with the conduct by him of his undertaking, for the purpose of identifying the measures he needs to take to comply with the requirements and prohibitions imposed upon him by or under the relevant statutory provisions;
- Regulation 11 of the Ionising Radiation Regulations 1999, which requires that every employer ensures their employees and other persons are not exposed to ionising radiation to an extent where any dose limit specified for such a class of person is excluded in any calendar year; and
- Regulation 38(2) of the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2010, which makes it an offence to fail to comply with or to contravene an environmental permit condition.
National pipeline operator fined after the loss of 35,000 litres of petrol
The British Pipeline Agency has been fined after a major leak at a terminal in the West Midlands.
The incident occurred at midnight on 20 October 2010, the company started to pump petrol from the pipeline into a tank at a neighbouring site within the terminal. Roughly half an hour later an alarm was activated and a high pressure leak of petrol was identified from an overground section of pipework.
It was identified that a secondary line feeding into the main pipework had broken loose and fuel was escaping under pressure, leading to it spraying into air and running across the site. An HSE investigation found that the pipework concerned had been altered as part of a major engineering project in the week preceding the incident. The reconfigured joints and fittings had not been properly commissioned and tested.
A major clean-up operation was undertaken, including decontamination of land affected at the site.
The British Pipeline Agency was fined £30,000 with costs of £58,606 for breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. This Section of the Act requires that employers ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all their employees.
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