OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #14342448
CANAL,LAWN MOWER,DROWN,WATER
Event description
EMPLOYEE APPARENTLY DROWNED WHILE CUTTING GRASS NEAR A CANAL
Investigation abstract
EMPLOYEE #1 WAS CUTTING GRASS ADJACENT TO A 12 FOOT DEEP CANAL. HE WAS USING A " BOBCAT" TYPE, SELF PROPELLED, WALK BEHIND LAWN MOWER, POWERED BY AN 11 HORSEPOWE R HONDA MOTOR (36 INCH CUT, ROTARY TYPE). HIS EMPLOYER WAS CUTTING GRASS IN FRON T OF THE HOUSE, OUT OF SITE OF EMPLOYEE #1. WHEN THE EMPLOYER WENT TO THE BACK Y ARD TO CHECK ON EMPLOYEE #1, HE WAS UNABLE TO FIND EITHER HIS EMPLOYEE (REPUTED TO BE A GOOD SWIMMER), OR THE LAWN MOWER. THE EMPLOYEE WAS FOUND LATER, BY A RES CUE SQUAD DIVER, SLUMPED OVER THE HANDLE BARS OF THE MOWER IN APPROXIMATELY 10 F EET OF MURKY WATER. THERE WERE NO WITNESSES TO THE ACCIDENT. THE GRASS WAS LOCAT ED ON SMOOTH GROUND, WITH A SLOPE OF 1 TO 4.
Victim
-
#1 Fatality Age 24 M
- Nature of injury
- 2
- Part of body
- 28
- Event type
- 5
- Source
- 41
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 1
- 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.