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 #14503866

HEAD,WORK RULES,EQUIPMENT OPERATOR,EARTHMOVING EQUIP,STARTED IN GEAR,UNMANNED,LOADER/BACKHOE,CONSTRUCTION,RUN OVER,MECH MALFUNCTION

Event
HEAD,WORK RULES,EQUIPMENT OPERATOR,EARTHMOVING EQUIP,STARTED IN GEAR,UNMANNED,LOADER/BACKHOE,CONSTRUCTION,RUN OVER,MECH MALFUNCTION
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
14503866
Report ID
729700

Event description

Employee killed when run over by loader/backhoe

Investigation abstract

At 9:15 a.m. on October 11, 1988, Employee #1, a backhoe operator, was standing The spring leaf shuttle lock was defective, allowing the shuttle lever to move t oo easily. At the time of the accident it was clear and 57 degrees F. on the right side of a J. I. Case loader/backhoe, model 580BCK, serial #8725571. He was using a screwdriver with a 13 in. blade to jump the solenoid because the starter button did not work. The backhoe started and began moving in reverse to ward an approximately 9 ft deep by 21 in. wide by 91 ft long open trench. A cowo rker warned another worker who was inside the trench. Employee #1 then apparentl y moved the power shuttle shift lever from REVERSE to FORWARD, causing the backh oe to start moving forward. The right rear tire ran over Employee #1's head and upper body. He died of cardiopulmonary arrest secondary to massive head trauma.

Victims (2)

  1. #1 Fatality Age 52 M

    Nature of injury
    21
    Part of body
    13
    Event type
    1
    Source
    27
    Occupation code
    999
    Human factor
    12
    Environmental factor
    8
    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

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.