Worker lost his leg when he was hit by a forklift truck during lifting operations
- Safety Flash
- Published on 2 March 2018
- Generated on 12 July 2025
- IMCA SF 05/18
- 1 minute read
The UK HSE reports that an engineering company has been fined after a worker lost his leg from the knee down when he was hit by a forklift truck.
What went wrong? What were the causes?
A worker was seriously injured whilst carrying out a lifting operation involving the transporting and loading of pipe spools onto a flatbed truck. A forklift truck, for which he was acting as banksman, drove into the back of his left heel. His left leg had to be amputated at the knee.
UK HSE investigation found that the company had failed to properly plan, organise and carry out the lifting operation in a safe manner.
The HSE inspector noted: “All lifts must be properly planned, assessed and carried out in a safe manner. There were other safer, reasonably practicable options that the company could have taken to prevent the forklift coming into contact with the individual. The safest method in this instance was to use tag lines or push sticks to control the load, as opposed to controlling the load by hand.”
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