construction zone accidents

A Richmond County worker has been killed in a crane accident at an International Paper wood yard facility.A press release by the company has said that Bill Drake was killed on February 2^nd at the plant’s facility on the Mike Padgett Highway.Drake was engaged in clearing wood debris on the tracks when he was struck by the metal cage of the crane. He died at the scene of the accident.

Drake worked as a crane operator, but that particular morning, he had been assigned the task of clearing the tracks. As per normal procedures, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration has initiated investigations into the accident.The company seems to have no record of accidents at the plant over the last five years.However, it has been subjected to inspections twice because of complaints.The first inspection resulted in fines for both minor as well as more serious violations, while the second inspection conducted last year did not yield any violations. An investigation by OSHA will likely take months, and it wouldn’t be possible to draw conclusions about the causes of the accident before the findings are out.There are several questions that can be raised about the accident though – for instance, who was operating the crane at the time of the accident? Was it a trained and qualified crane operator?Did Drake receive warnings while he was engaged in the debris clearing work, alerting him to possible danger from the crane?

Very often, workplace accidents are the result of inadequate safety precautions followed by employers as well as other workers at the scene of the accident. Employees need to be properly trained to handle the tasks they are performing, as well as a safe working environment where all safety precautions are followed stringently.

More than two weeks after the construction accident at the Atlanta Botanical Garden that killed one worker and injured 18 others, the last worker who was still receiving treatment for his injuries, has been discharged from the hospital.

That means all of the workers who were injured are now back at home, many still facing the prospect of extensive physical rehabilitative therapy to regain their strength. Since the collapse of the pedestrian walkway at the Garden on December 19, doctors have treated workers with injuries ranging from fractures, to spinal and brain injuries.Fortunately, there have been no spinal cord injuries that resulted in paralysis. At The Shepherd Center, where doctors treated at least half a dozen victims of the collapse, all the workers were able to walk out of the facility. Fortunately, there have been no spinal cord injuries that resulted in paralysis.

The accident occurred when workers were pouring concrete on the walkway, billed as the only one of its kind in the country. The bridge suddenly collapsed, toppling all workers standing on the bridge, more than 40 feet to the ground below. One worker, Angel Chupin was confirmed dead in the initial minutes after the accident.The collapse has raised questions about the stability of the under-construction pedestrian bridge, and the kind of priority given to the security of workers who were on the bridge. In the days after the accident, we have also learned that Hardin Construction, the company that was overseeing construction work at the walkway, has had a worker die in an accident in 2001, when his head became trapped between a ceiling and platform at a construction site. The concrete company that was overseeing the pouring of the concrete on the walkway has also had a worker death in the past due to a truck malfunction. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is conducting investigations into the accident at the Garden, but it will be months before we find out the level of negligence that may have caused the structure to collapse the way it did.

Articles Tagged with construction zone accidents

Richmond County Worker Killed in Crane Accident

Atlanta Botanical Garden Construction Accident Update