January 2020 – Work Related Fatal Injuries Data from HSE

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) recently released annual figures for work-related fatal injuries for 2018/19. The data revealed that 147 workers were fatally injured, which is at a rate of approximately 1 worker per 200,000. There was an increase of 6 fatalities over the previous year, although the number has remained broadly level in recent years.

The fatal workplace injuries are spread across different sectors, with agriculture, forestry, fishing and waste and recycling seeing the largest fatalities with 32 deaths. This sector accounts for a small fraction of the workforce but has 20% of worker fatalities. The three most common causes of fatal injuries which account for 60% of the injuries are:

  • Workers falling from height (40)
  • Being struck by a moving vehicle (30)
  • Being struck by a moving object (16)
Forklift Truck Incidents Involving a Third Person

The HSE data also highlights risks to older workers. Workers aged 60 or over account for 10% of the workforce but 25% of the fatal injuries were to this age group.

In addition to the above figures, 92 members of the public were fatally injured in incidents connected to work.

One fatal accident that may be of interest to our customers took place at Michael Douglas Autosalvage Ltd in Carlisle. A customer had purchased a lift truck from the salvage company which was being loaded onto a recovery vehicle. The metal ring on the lift truck that the winch wire was attached to failed, causing the lift truck to fall and trap the customer against the skip lorry. The HSE found that the company had failed to ensure that the lifting process was properly planned by a competent person and failed in its duty not to expose customers to risk. Michael Douglas Autosalvage Ltd was fined £23,000 and ordered to pay costs of £8000.

For more information, click here for link to HSE site.

Wallace School of Transport is a fully accredited RTITB company with over 50 years’ experience. You can be trained either at your own work site or at Wallace Centre in Park Royal. If you have any questions, call Wallace Forklift Training on 020 8453 3440, choose option 3 or click here to email us.

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