104,543Records 70,659Employers 84,666Hospitalizations 27,563Amputations 2015-01-01 2025-09-30
Safety Incidents OSHA Severe Injury Reports · 2015–2025

OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #14557318

CHEST,OIL WELL DRILLING,DRAWWORKS,CATHEAD,PIPE,STRUCK BY,TONGS,PULLEY,OIL RIG,LEAD

Event
CHEST,OIL WELL DRILLING,DRAWWORKS,CATHEAD,PIPE,STRUCK BY,TONGS,PULLEY,OIL RIG,LEAD
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
14557318
Report ID
653510

Event description

EMPLOYEE STRUCK IN THE CHEST BY LEAD TONGS OF AN OIL RIG

Investigation abstract

ON RG DRILLING RIG #1, EMPLOYEE #1, A DRILLER, WAS TRYING TO TEACH THE MOTOR MAN HOW TO BECOME A DRILLER. HE WAS USING THE BACK-UP TONGS TO SHOW THE FLOOR HAND HOW TO HOLD THE LEAD TONGS. AT THIS TIME, THE MOTOR MAN, WHO IS LEFT-HANDED, PUS HED THE WRONG CONTROL. THE LEAD TONGS, HELD IN PLACE BY A SNUB LINE AT THE END, ROTATED TOWARD THE DRAWWORKS. THE PIPE GRIPS STRUCK EMPLOYEE #1 IN THE CHEST. TH E PIPE GRIPS ON THE LEAD TONGS WERE NOT CONNECTED. THE LINE FROM THE CATHEAD IS CONNECTED TO A PULLEY NEAR THE END OF THE LEAD TONGS. WHEN THE CONTROLS WERE ACT IVATED AND POWER WAS SUPPLIED, THIS PULLEY CAUSED THE TONGS TO ROTATE.

Victim

  1. #1 Fatality Age 49 M

    Nature of injury
    12
    Part of body
    5
    Event type
    1
    Source
    26
    Occupation code
    614
    Human factor
    10
    Environmental factor
    5
    Task assigned
    2

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.