OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #676387
GEHRING FARMS
SALEM, OR·
Event description
Employee drowned in irrigation pond trying to locate truck
Investigation abstract
Employee #1 was employed as a farm laborer and assigned to irrigation. That morn he resurfaced, the inner tube had drifted away a short distance. He began to sw im toward the inner tube and almost reached it before turning toward shore, when he apparently tired and started to struggle. Attempts were made to reach him wi th a pole, but they proved fruitless. He immediately sank beneath the surface an d did not resurface. Employee #1 drowned. One of the foremen dove several times attempting to rescue him, but could not find him in the murky water. The body wa s recovered several hours later by a diver. Factors contributing to the accident were Employee #1's minimal ability to swim, failure to determine his swimming a bility, failure to stop him from entering the water contrary to the plan, and la ck of adequate personal protective equipment and proper rescue equipment. ing, he had apparently failed to set the parking brake or leave the transmission in park when he parked the pickup truck on the road adjacent to the irrigation pond. The vehicle rolled into the pond and sank. That afternoon, a plan was devi sed and put into action to retrieve the truck. One foreman floated onto the pond on an inner tube and attempted to locate the truck with a length of PVC pipe, w hile the other foreman and Employee #1 assisted from the bank. A short time afte r beginning the search, Employee #1 decided to go into the water on another inne r tube. He then dove from the inner tube and attempted to locate the truck. When
Victim
-
#1 Fatality Age 19 Male
- Nature of injury
- Amputation (1)
- Part of body
- BODYSYSTEM (4)
- Accident type
- CARD-VASC/RESP FAIL. (12)
- Source of injury
- WATER (41)
- Occupation
- Farm workers (479)
- Human factor
- MISJUDGMENT, HAZ. SITUATION (1)
- Environmental factor
- WORK-SURFACE/FACIL-LAYOUT COND (13)
- Task assigned
- Task not regularly assigned (2)
Labels are OSHA's own, from the code dictionary published with the accident-investigation file. The raw code is shown beside each one so this page can be reconciled against OSHA's bulk data. OSHA notes that nature of injury, part of body, source of injury and accident type in this file are not coded to the Occupational Injury and Illness Classification System, and that the occupation titles are not standardised — so these values are not directly comparable with the OIICS-coded severe injury reports.