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Safety Incidents OSHA Severe Injury Reports · 2015–2025

OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #607440

KNEE,HIP,FRACTURE,HIGH WIND,BUILDING COLLAPSE,CONSTRUCTION

Event
KNEE,HIP,FRACTURE,HIGH WIND,BUILDING COLLAPSE,CONSTRUCTION
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
607440
Report ID
454714

Event description

One employee killed, two others injured in building collapse

Investigation abstract

At about 2:00 p.m. on May 16, 1988, Employees #1 through #3 were in a two-story wooden apartment building that was under construction when it collapsed during a severe thunderstorm. When the storm struck Employees #1 and 2 were installing a n HVAC duct; Employee #3 and two employees of a framing contractor had taken she lter in the building. Employee #1 died; Employee #2 sustained a broken hip; and Employee #3 sustained a broken knee. Employees #2 and #3 were hospitalized. They apparently did not realize that thunderstorm winds could cause a building in th is stage of construction (roof on and no siding) to collapse.

Victims (4)

  1. #1 Fatality Age 20 M

    Nature of injury
    2
    Part of body
    28
    Event type
    1
    Source
    32
    Occupation code
    999
    Human factor
    14
    Environmental factor
    6
    Task assigned
    1
  2. #2 Hospitalized Age 34 M

    Nature of injury
    12
    Part of body
    14
    Event type
    1
    Source
    32
    Occupation code
    999
    Human factor
    14
    Environmental factor
    6
    Task assigned
    1
  3. #3 Hospitalized Age 40 M

    Nature of injury
    12
    Part of body
    15
    Event type
    1
    Source
    32
    Occupation code
    999
    Human factor
    14
    Environmental factor
    6
    Task assigned
    1
  4. #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.