105,313Records 71,083Employers 85,290Hospitalizations 27,770Amputations 2015-01-01 2025-10-31
Safety Incidents OSHA Severe Injury Reports · 2015–2025

OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #14414601

WINDOW WASHER,SKULL,ROPE,FALL,BOSUN CHAIR,WORK RULES,ELEVATED WORK PLAT,FRACTURE,CAUGHT BY,TRUCK

Event
WINDOW WASHER,SKULL,ROPE,FALL,BOSUN CHAIR,WORK RULES,ELEVATED WORK PLAT,FRACTURE,CAUGHT BY,TRUCK
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
14414601
Report ID
729300

Event description

Window washer dies when work platform pulled from building

Investigation abstract

At approximately 12:30 p.m. on July 29, 1987, Employee #1 was suspended in a boa tswain's chair, washing windows outside a five-story building. His rappelling ro pe hung down to the ground, passing in front of a garage door. When a delivery v an drove out of the garage, the rope became caught in its rear bumper. The emplo yee's work platform was pulled from the building and he and his rigging fell 50 ft to the ground. Employee #1 suffered a fractured skull; he died at the scene.

Victims (3)

  1. #1 Fatality Age 27 M

    Nature of injury
    12
    Part of body
    13
    Event type
    5
    Source
    30
    Occupation code
    999
    Human factor
    4
    Environmental factor
    18
    Task assigned
    1
  2. #981 Degree 0 Age 0

    Nature of injury
    0
    Part of body
    0
    Event type
    0
    Source
    0
    Occupation code
    0
    Human factor
    0
    Environmental factor
    0
    Task assigned
    0
  3. #982 Degree 0 Age 0

    Nature of injury
    0
    Part of body
    0
    Event type
    0
    Source
    0
    Occupation code
    0
    Human factor
    0
    Environmental factor
    0
    Task assigned
    0

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.