OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #998427
FRACTURE,HEAD,CONSTRUCTION,SKULL,FALL,FALL PROTECTION,FLOOR OPENING,UNGUARDED
Event description
CONSTRUCTION EMPLOYEE KILLED IN FALL THRU FLOOR OPENING
Investigation abstract
AT APPROXIMATELY 9:45 AM ON MAY 28, 1987, EMPLOYEE #1 WAS WORKING ON THE SECOND SUPPORT THE CONCRETE BLOCK WALL DURING BACKFILLING. HE THEN FELL TO THE CONCRETE PAD IN THE BASEMENT. EMPLOYEE #1 DIED IN THE HOSPITAL EMERGENCY ROOM OF SEVERE TRAUMA AND A SKULL FRACTURE ON THE LEFT SIDE. FLOOR LEVEL OF A SINGLE FAMILY HOUSE UNDER CONSTRUCTION. THERE WERE TWO 2 BY 12 INCH, 18 FOOT LONG PLANKS COVERING A 6 FOOT BY 34 INCH OPENING FOR A FIREPLACE D UCT. THE PLANKS WERE IN THE WAY SO THE EMPLOYEES WERE GOING TO PLACE THEM ON THE WALL HEADERS. EMPLOYEE #1 PLACED THE OUTSIDE PLANK ON TOP OF THE INSIDE PLANK, EXPOSING THE FLOOR OPENING. WHILE HE WAS WAITING FOR ADDITIONAL HELP TO LIFT THE PLANKS, IT APPEARS THAT EMPLOYEE #1 FELL BACKWARDS THROUGH THE OPENING, THEN TH ROUGH AN UNCOVERED FLOOR OPENING ON THE FIRST FLOOR LEVEL AND INTO THE BASEMENT. IT APPEARS THAT HIS HEAD STRUCK THE EDGE OF A 2 BY 12 INCH PLANK BEING USED TO
Victim
-
#1 Fatality Age 23 M
- Nature of injury
- 12
- Part of body
- 13
- Event type
- 5
- Source
- 42
- Occupation code
- 567
- Human factor
- 9
- 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.