OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #972240
KNEE,FRACTURE,REPAIR,WORK RULES,TRENCH,BACK,SHORING,WATER PIPE,CAVE-IN,SPRAIN
Event description
Two employees injured in trench cave-in
Investigation abstract
Employee #1 was in an unshored trench that was 6 ft deep, 8 ft long, and 4 ft wi de and was receiving water from a leaking water main. He was preparing the water main for repairs when a section of the trench wall fell on him. During rescue a ttempts, more of the wall kept falling into the trench. During one of those fall s, Employee #2 sprained his lower back. Both employees were taken to the hospita l. Employee #1, who had broken and crushed bones in his right knee and had dislo cated his left knee, damaging tendons, ligaments, and other soft tissues, requir ed surgery to both knees. Employee #2 was treated and given 24 hours bed rest.
Victims (2)
-
#1 Hospitalized Age 32 M
- Nature of injury
- 12
- Part of body
- 15
- Event type
- 1
- Source
- 12
- Occupation code
- 599
- Human factor
- 17
- Environmental factor
- 13
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#2 Non-hospitalized injury Age 26 M
- Nature of injury
- 20
- Part of body
- 3
- Event type
- 1
- Source
- 12
- Occupation code
- 599
- Human factor
- 17
- Environmental factor
- 13
- 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.