"prosecutor's office... two years in prison for the death of a worker..."

 

The coordination of maintenance work performed by outside contractors and employees within an aluminium company is a must. Here is a recent legal story or a past incident that highlights the importance of communication during maintenance procedures.

The prosecution is requesting two years in prison for two managers of the Contracting company and two others at the Aluminium company for the death of a worker at the Aluminium plant when the firing oven was being overhauled; it happened seven years ago and now the trial will be held in the next few days in the Criminal Court. The prosecutor's office observes a crime of reckless homicide and another against the rights of workers.

The prosecution's brief states that " (in November) 2017, at approximately 9:00 a.m., two workers from the company CONTRACTING COMPANY, JM and FJ, accessed the electrode firing furnace warehouse located in the facilities of the company ALUMINIUM COMPANY, to carry out the six-monthly review of the rails of the existing overhead cranes in the aforementioned warehouse".

"This task," says the prosecution's brief, "is carried out on a platform located about 7 meters above the floor of the warehouse, with a width of 1.15 meters, however there are 90 cm metal pillars that reduce the available width to 25 cm, which would also be reduced to 13 cm. when the overhead crane moves next to the pillar. In theory, one of the two CONTRACTING COMPANY workers should be on observation duty, equipped with a walkie, while his colleague carried out the visual inspection of the lanes. At a certain point, the overhead crane did not start its movement along the ship, its driver being in a "reverse" position, and during this movement he crushed JM against one of the pillars of the ship, who died instantly".

The prosecutor's office understands that "this fact derives from the defective coordination of activities between the two competing companies, the contractor who owns the facilities,  and the auxiliary CONTRACTING COMPANY, for the simultaneous performance of maintenance and production activities without establishing adequate and sufficient coordination measures, given the obvious danger of the task carried out by the deceased, and this despite the fact that it is a periodic task. Thus, the driver of the overhead crane had not been warned either by his company, ALUMINIUM COMPANY , or by CONTRACTING COMPANY of the presence of workers carrying out maintenance in the radius of action of the crane, even knowing that during half of the movements of the overhead crane it would not have any visibility over the route when reversing. Nor had the CONTRACTING COMPANY workers received clear instructions as to who had the obligation to notify the overhead crane operator of their presence in the danger zone, with the result that, despite the plurality of administrative procedures prior to the task (access permits, work procedures), it was apparently the two CONTRACTING COMPANY workers who were responsible for notifying the overhead crane operator and other workers of the ship of their presence".

"On the part of ALUMINIUM COMPANY , the defendant was the maximum responsible for the facility in which the events took place, and in that capacity he signed the access and work permits for the workers of CONTRACTING COMPANY, in which it was expressly stated that it was not necessary to consign any equipment inside the warehouse and nothing was established about the need for coordination between the two companies. The other defendant, as head of occupational risk prevention, approved the work permit in question, without establishing any coordination mechanism between companies or raising any objection," the brief states.

"On the part of CONTRACTING COMPANY, the defendant was the team leader at the ALUMINIUM COMPANY facilities, corresponding to the superior command in all aspects of the work, and another was a site manager for the entire company, with identical command functions. Both approved and signed the aforementioned access and work permits, without establishing the need to assign any equipment, without establishing any coordination mechanism between companies or formulating any objection. And this despite the fact that CONTRACTING COMPANY's internal work procedure did specifically provide for the need to consign the equipment on which it was working, and it had been approved as such," he indicates.

 

"Therefore, all the defendants, each in the scope of their respective responsibility, created the conditions for JM's death to occur. The two managers of CONTRACTING COMPANY did not ensure that all the requirements were met for the maintenance task to be carried out safely, either by temporarily suspending the operation of the overhead crane or by having evidence that the operator of the same was duly notified of the presence of the CONTRACTING COMPANY workers. For their part, the defendants with functions in occupational risk prevention on behalf of ALUMINIUM COMPANY, did not take the relevant measures to ensure that the task was carried out in safe conditions or to ensure that all the operators who worked simultaneously in the warehouse, regardless of the company they were, were aware of the tasks being carried out and that the channels of communication were clearly established. ultimately consenting that the responsibility for giving notice of their presence fell on the workers involved, and this despite the fact that it was a periodic review and, therefore, foreseeable," considers the prosecutor.

"The wife of the deceased renounces all civil and criminal actions that could correspond to her for these facts, having been compensated by the insurers of CONTRACTING COMPANY and ALUMINIUM COMPANY," it concludes.

We offer our sincere condolences for the deceased workers There were so many mistakes laid out by the prosecutors that contributed to this worker’s death.

We hope that the reader will use this tragedy to make their workplace safer.

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