Health & Safety breach costs Corus UK £100,000

Steelmaker Corus UK Ltd. has been fined £100,000 for an incident involving an untrained worker and a crane that occurred in 2008.

A mobile crane overturned while working at the Aldwarke Steel Works in Rotherham on 4th September. Fortunately, the driver of the crane escaped with minor injuries as the vehicle turned over.

The reason for the incident was a lack of driver training. The crane was fitted with safe working load alarms, but as the driver was not properly trained they had not been turned on. When the crane then went past its safe limits there was no warning and the accident happened.

The Health and Safety Executive took action and prosecuted Corus UK for the incident.

Geoff Clarke, HSE Inspector commented:

"This is a serious health and safety breach by a company that globally employs tens of thousands of people which could easily have led to people being killed. The operator was extremely lucky to escape with only minor injuries.

Today's hearing highlights the importance of having an effective system in place for managing health and safety to stop easily avoidable incidents. In this case the measures in place were simply inadequate, in particular, there was a substantial failure to provide enough suitable training."

Sheffiled Crown Court decided Corus must pay a £100,000 fine due to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. £9,908.54 was also awarded in costs.

SOURCE: HSE