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 #593608

SEWER,TRENCH,PLUMBING,CAVE-IN,CONTUSION

Event
SEWER,TRENCH,PLUMBING,CAVE-IN,CONTUSION
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
593608
Report ID
419400

Event description

EMPLOYEE INJURED IN TRENCH CAVE-IN

Investigation abstract

Employee #1 was working in a trench, approximately 3 feet wide and 10 to 12 feet deep, attempting to replace a 4-inch sewer line. The trench was not shored or s loped and the spoils were piled at the trench opening. The weight of the trench spoils caused the west wall of the trench to cave in completely, covering Employ ee #1 under approx 2 feet of soil. After emergency personnel were summoned, a 2. 5-hour rescue culminated in Employee #1 being freed from the cave-in in very goo d condition with no broken bones.

Victim

  1. #1 Non-hospitalized injury Age 23 M

    Nature of injury
    3
    Part of body
    16
    Event type
    2
    Source
    12
    Occupation code
    585
    Human factor
    20
    Environmental factor
    4
    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.