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 #14480461

HEAD,UNCONSCIOUSNESS,ASPHYXIATED,WORK RULES,STRUCK AGAINST,CAUGHT BETWEEN,CONVEYOR,STRUCK BY

Event
HEAD,UNCONSCIOUSNESS,ASPHYXIATED,WORK RULES,STRUCK AGAINST,CAUGHT BETWEEN,CONVEYOR,STRUCK BY
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
14480461
Report ID
214200

Event description

Employee dies of asphyxia between box and wall opening

Investigation abstract

Between 12:00 noon and 1:30 p.m. on May 21, 1986, Employee #1 was sending plasti is body through the wall opening as a cardboard container was ascending. As Empl oyee #1 pulled out, he could have struck the back of his head against the top ex terior portion of the wall opening, and fallen unconscious. The approximately 15 lb container, which measured 23 in. high by 20 in. wide by 17 in. long, continu ed to rise and struck Employee #1, lodging against his throat. He died of asphyx ia. There were no witnesses to the accident. c hardware products in cardboard containers from the first level storeroom up an inclined, fabric-belted, mechanically driven conveyor through a wall opening to the second level storeroom. The process, as explained by the store manager, is as follows: Employee #1, the operator, loaded the conveyor and then walked up a central staircase to the conveyor on the second level, where it runs horizontall y into the storeroom unloading area. The conveyor controls were installed there, just inside the wall opening, and readily accessible for an emergency stop. The store manager believes that Employee #1 must have stretched the upper part of h

Victim

  1. #1 Fatality Age 24 M

    Nature of injury
    2
    Part of body
    20
    Event type
    2
    Source
    7
    Occupation code
    999
    Human factor
    1
    Environmental factor
    8
    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.