Dundas concrete manufacturer fined $225K after death of worker on the job
CBC
A concrete manufacturer in Dundas, Ont., has been fined $225,000 after a worker fell into a concrete mixer and died in October 2021.
Coreslab Structures, a precast concrete producer, was fined after pleading guilty to endangering the safety of a worker. The company will also have to pay a 25 per cent victim surcharge.
According to the Ontario Ministry of Labour, a worker was found fatally injured inside a steel concrete mixing tank at the company on Oct. 18, 2021.
Emergency crews were called to the company just before 6:25 p.m., after reports of an industrial accident, police said at the time.
At the end of every shift, the mixer requires cleaning, including the inside where the concrete is mixed. Cleaning inside requires a worker to go into the mixer through one of two top entry hatches, the ministry said in a news release on Thursday.
To ensure the mixer is safe to clean, Coreslab Structures developed a step-by-step safe cleaning procedure and provided it to workers appointed to clean the equipment.
Each step, when performed on its own, stopped the mixer from operating, the ministry said. These steps include physically turning and removing two keys from the main panel and placing them into each of the hatch locks to allow access into the mixer.
Prior to the incident in 2021, both hatch locks had ceased working due to a build-up of concrete and concrete dust within the locking mechanisms, and both had been removed for repair, the ministry said. As a result, access into the mixer did not, at that time, require unlocking the hatch locks with the keys from the main panel to permit temporary access to the operating mixer.
The company was convicted on Sept. 15. CBC Hamilton reached out to Coreslab Structures for comment but did not receive a response before publication.
The court also imposed the victim fine surcharge, as required by the Provincial Offences Act. The surcharge is credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.
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