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

OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #221617020

THE PROFESSIONAL TREE CARE COMPANY

Event
Blunt force trauma, Chest, Ditch, Hill, Pulling, Skidder, Struck Against, Tree, Tree Skidding
NAICS
561730
Inspection type
Federal Agency
Activity number
#347108748
Employer profile
THE PROFESSIONAL TREE CARE COMPANY
Summary number
221617020
Report ID
0950613

Event description

Employee is killed in skidder accident

Investigation abstract

At 8:30 a.m. on November 16, 2023, an employee was operating a Caterpillar 518 skidder to pull a cut tree trunk down a hill. As the employee was driving down the hill on a fire road and approached a left turn in the road, he continued straight forward instead of turning left for unknown reasons. As a result, the skidder continued off the fire road and down the hill. The skidder struck several small trees and continued down into a ditch, which had an approximate 5-foot drop. A coworker witnessed the employee on the ground next to the skidder. The employee was initially observed on his knees and then collapsed. The employee had blunt force trauma to the chest, which was fatal.

Victim

  1. #1 Fatality Age 47 M

    Event type
    6
    Occupation code
    853

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.