Company Fined $70,000 after Worker Is Injured by Bundles Falling from Truck

A worker was delivering metal tubing that was bundled and the bundles stacked to a height of about nine feet off the truck’s flatbed. A forklift operator was removing bundles from the truck when some bundles fell over. One bundle, weighing about 760 kilos, struck and pinned the worker, who suffered a significant number of broken bones. An MOL investigation found that the company didn’t have a procedure or safe practice on where a truck driver was to remain during the unloading process. The company pleaded guilty to failing to ensure that the load on the truck was transported, placed or stored so that the bundles wouldn’t tip, collapse or fall and could be removed without endangering a worker’s safety and to provide information, instruction and supervision to a worker on how to safety unload/move items from a flatbed truck. The court fined it $70,000 [Sport Systems Unlimited Corp., Govt. News Release, Dec. 18, 2014].