Two superintendents have been found guilty of offences under Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act and fined $4,000 each after a worker died when a scissor lift was knocked over by a garage door.
The accident happened when a mechanic pushed a cart through an open garage door, triggering an electric eye mechanism that caused the door to open and strike the scissor lift, knocking it over, as the door moved along its track. The workers had been insulating an overhead water pipe and were tied-off to the scissor lift platform. Both workers on the scissor lift fell 20 feet to the floor below. One of those workers died and the other suffered broken bones.
The superintendents were on the jobsite at the time of the accident and supervising the task of insulating the overhead water pipe. They had not ensured that the lockout procedure of the Toronto Transit Commission (where the work was being done) had been followed, contrary to their employer’s contract with the TTC.
The court found the two superintendents guilty of failing to take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of a worker, contrary to section 27(2)(c) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act. Specifically, they failed to take the reasonable precaution of ensuring that an overhead garage door could not contact an elevated work platform upon which two workers were working.
The superintendents’ employer was also convicted of OHSA offences and fined $125,000.
The Ministry of Labour’s press release can be found here.
