Demo company and director fined over accident

Bagshot, Surrey UK - WOOLRIDGE Ecotec, a demolition company from Bagshot, was fined £15,000 with £5,000 costs in September 2008, for breaching health and safety regulations after an accident when electrician Barry Murrell fell 15 feet and broke his pelvis in 2005. Nicholas Anderson, one of the company's directors, was fined £5,000 with £1,650 costs after he also pleaded guilty to breaching the regulations. In March 2005 Mr Murrell stepped on some steel sheet material that covered a hole during a demolition job at the former Pirelli Cables factory in Erith. He broke his pelvis, fractured his right hip, shattered a hip socket and broke a rib. HSE inspector Lorain Charles said, "The risks of falls from height on this demolition project and the measures needed to control those risks had been identified on more than one occasion. The director, Mr Anderson had personal knowledge of the circumstances surrounding or leading to this accident and he failed to take obvious steps to prevent it." [Contracts Journal Sept08