Two companies and a manager have been fined a total of £490,000 after a worker suffered 90 per cent burns and died, when the aerosol canisters he was crushing caught fire.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) prosecuted the metal company (Company A) for failing to have proper controls in place to manage the extremely flammable materials that led to the fatal burn injuries on 12 April 2005. A separate health and safety charge was also brought by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) against the manager of the company.
Caernarfon Crown Court heard how the company had received the canisters from another company (Company B) that had not been clearly labelled and segregated them from less hazardous waste.
This meant that employees handling the canisters assumed they were empty when in fact they contained substances which should have been labelled "extremely flammable" and treated as such.
The court was told the manager of the company instructed the victim to crush the canisters in a metal baler. When the baler was activated, a canister caught fire, engulfing the victim in flames.
Suitable risk assessments had not been carried out before allowing workers to handle potentially hazardous materials such as aerosols, and both companies had failed to train or monitor staff in their disposal.
The HSEs Head of Operations in Wales commented:
"Both companies contributed to the death by allowing this highly dangerous situation to arise. Company B had a clear responsibility to ensure the canisters were labelled correctly and separated from non-hazardous waste, and to have procedures to prevent such dangerous waste being inadvertently removed from their site. By failing to do this, they put workers in danger.
"Company A lacked proper procedures for handling hazardous materials and operating dangerous machinery. They assumed the canisters were empty, but this proved to be a fatal error of judgement."
"This is a tragic case and must serve as a warning to other companies handling potentially dangerous material about the consequences of not having safe working practices in place."
Company A pleaded guilty to charges under Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and Regulation 3(1) of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. The company was fined £100,000 and ordered to pay costs of £10,000.
Company B pleaded guilty to a charge under Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and was fined £330,000 with £50,000 costs.
The manager of company A pleaded guilty to a charge under Section 7(a) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and was fined £10,000.