A North Sea oil contractor has been fined £535,000 after a worker sustained life changing injuries following, in 2017, the uncontrolled collapse of a crane. An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that the company had failed to carry out a suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks of the work and had failed to maintain the crane braking systems and equipment in a safe condition before work commenced.

A Leeds commercial printing company has been fined £100,000 after an employee’s hand was crushed by a laminating machine. The employee was attempting to fix a laminating machine when his right hand was drawn into the device and crushed between two rollers. A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation into the incident found the laminating machine was not adequately guarded and that the company failed to review existing risk assessments for the machine which required the production of a safe system of work.

A West Yorkshire manufacturing company was fined £200,000 after three workers were injured by an explosion. The cause of the explosion was determined to be water entering the furnace during the addition of scrap metal. A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found that Weir Minerals Europe Limited was aware of the risk associated with wet scrap metal being added to the furnace. However the protection from rain that was in place at the time of the incident was not adequately implemented and maintained

A Leicestershire Quarry company has been fined £1,275,000 after a contractor was crushed to death during maintenance work. A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation into this incident found that the company had failed to ensure that the powers supply had been properly isolated before the repair work commenced. The test button on the conveyor electrical panel was not connected to the test circuit and was therefore inoperative. This issue appears to have existed for many years before the incident suggesting that critical defects had not been recorded and rectified in a timely manner. The company should have also provided a visual and audible pre-start alarm for the conveyor.