07.04.2007

Manchester accident Update

One of the two men that were injured when their trailer mounted aerial lift fell over in Manchester last Wednesday night has died. The man aged 57 died from the head injuries that he received in the fall.
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Albert Square the night of the accident

The other man has now been released from Hospital. The accident occurred in Albert square where the two men were working on the statue. It seems they were working at a height of around nine metres.

The aerial lift has been identified as an old 17 metre Simon Topper, the machine tipped over sideways, possibly due to a problem with one of the outriggers.
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A very similar Simon Topper

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Vertikal Comment

This is a clearly a tragic accident that with the information we have is impossible to say for certain how and why it happened. One thing is for sure, this was an exceptionally old machine with none of the most basic safety features that have been the norm for 15 years now.

It seems certain that this accident was related to the deployment or failure of the rear outriggers. Although this is by no means certain.

CE approval came into law for aerial lifts between 1992 and 1994 perhaps now is the time to introduce a rule that requires older machines to be either taken out of service or subjected to a much higher level of inspection as is already the case in Finland and Australia?

It would do the industry as a whole a great service if the HSE would make the information available within the next 10 days so that any lessons might be learnt from this accident (and others) sooner rather than later.