OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #14278584
ROPE,WORK RULES,TREE,STRUCK BY,CRANE
Event description
EMPLOYEE STRUCK AND KILLED BY TREE DURING TREE REMOVAL
Investigation abstract
EMPLOYEE #1 WAS WORKING AS THE GROUND PERSON IN A TREE REMOVAL OPERATION. A 1/2 DOWN AND STRUCK THE CRANE TREE, AS EXPECTED. AS THE CUT TREE STRUCK THE CRANE T REE, THE ROPE BROKE AT THE KNOT, ALLOWING THE TREE TO FALL ON EMPLOYEE #1 AND KI LL HIM. THE ROPE WAS NOT DESIGNED FOR SUCH USE, AND NOT OF SUFFICIENT STRENGTH T O PREVENT BREAKING UNDER A LOAD. INCH NYLON ROPE WOULD BE TIED TO THE TOP OF THE TREE BEING REMOVED. THE ROPE WOU LD THEN BE PLACED OVER ANOTHER TREE, CALLED A "CRANE TREE". THE ROPE WOULD BE PL ACED HIGHER IN THE "CRANE TREE" THAN THE TREE TO BE FELLED. THE ROPE IS THEN BRO UGHT DOWN TO THE BASE OF THE CRANE TREE AND WRAPPED TWICE AROUND ITS BASE. THE R OPE BETWEEN THE TWO TREES IS KEPT TIGHT TO PREVENT WHIPPING. THE TREE BEING REMO VED IS THEN CUT AT THE BASE. THE ROPE PREVENTS THE CUT TREE FROM FALLING. THE TR EE WORKER THEN CUTS THE TREE FROM THE BOTTOM. EMPLOYEE #1 WAS STANDING NEXT TO T HE CRANE TREE. THE TREE BEING REMOVED WAS CUT BY THE FOREMAN. THE CUT TREE SWUNG
Victim
-
#1 Fatality Age 39 M
- Nature of injury
- 6
- Part of body
- 5
- Event type
- 1
- Source
- 43
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 6
- Environmental factor
- 18
- Task assigned
- 1
Codes shown verbatim from OSHA's accident-investigation database. A human-readable decoder is coming in a future release once the accident_lookup2 dictionary is loaded.