OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #14412449
REPAIR,STRUCK AGAINST,CONSTRUCTION,TRENCH,SHORING,UNSTABLE SOIL,SLOPING,BURIED,CAVE-IN,BACKHOE
Event description
Two employees killed in trench cave-in
Investigation abstract
Employees #1 and #2 were making a point repair to a sewer line in a trench. Empl oyee #1 was operating a backhoe while Employee #2 was inside the approximately 1 8 ft deep by 9 ft wide by 21 ft long trench. A 6 ft high by 3 ft wide by 18 ft l ong trench box had been installed but the trench walls above the box were neithe r shored nor sloped. While the backhoe was moving just north of the trench, the north wall started to cave in. Employee #1 jumped into the trench to help Employ ee #2 but the wall gave way, covering Employee #2 and causing Employee #1's head to strike against the backhoe bucket. Both were killed.
Victims (2)
-
#1 Fatality Age 35 M
- Nature of injury
- 21
- Part of body
- 13
- Event type
- 6
- Source
- 12
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 20
- Environmental factor
- 6
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#2 Fatality Age 28 M
- Nature of injury
- 2
- Part of body
- 4
- Event type
- 2
- Source
- 12
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 20
- Environmental factor
- 6
- 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.