A deck detached from a large scissor lift on a site in Northampton, UK, yesterday afternoon seriously injuring two men.
The incident has triggered an enormous amount of social media and other activity, much of it false, some of it libellous. We now feel satisfied that we have nailed down and verified most of the information. Sadly, so far, most of those directly involved have not responded to our requests. But it is early days, and hopefully the ‘Tell Your Story’ principle will kick in.
We are told that the incident occurred yesterday afternoon at a new site being built by Winvic Construction. One thing we can confrim now is that it was NOT an Amazon site - as most people claim. A sub-contractor may have also been involved. The machine involved is a new 65ft LGMG SR2024E electric Rough Terrain scissor lift owned by Premier Plant & Tool Hire, which is now owned by the contractor - Winvic. Note: Premier Plant & Tool IS NOT connected to Premier Platforms!
The lift looks to have been fully elevated with the large roll-out deck extension fully out. Several reports state that it struck a large water pipe, just before the platform detached from the scissor arms. It is important to state clearly that we have not yet been able to confirm or eliminate this detail. Although one of the photos received does show that the scissor stack appears be more than close to the pipe.
The scene shortly after the incident occurred
How the platform became fully detached from the arms is hard to explain and highly unusual. Inspectors from the UK Health & Safety Executive were due to open an investigation this morning.
The two men fell to the ground along with the platform and were both very seriously injured. We understand, but have not been able to verify it, that one of the men is no longer listed as critical, while the other has multiple life changing injuries and is still at risk.
We have reached out to Winvic and the HSE for a statement, but so far have not received any answers. The manufacturer LGMG did respond and stated that it has had technicians on site since yesterday and is cooperating fully with the contractors involved. It also added that it will issue a statement in due course. And added that in the meantime the thoughts of all those at LGMG are with the two men and their families at this dreadful time.
LGMG UK is also postponing an open day that was scheduled for tomorrow. LGMG has also confirmed that it had a technician on site yesterday evening, but he was not allowed access. A team returned very early this morning and one of them was allowed access to the machine as soon as the HSE inspectors arrived. And is helping with the investigaton.The HSE has issued a brief statement whcih said: “Our inspectors visited the site on Wednesday (26 March) to make enquiries alongside Northamptonshire Police.”
On a side note, one person working for one of the UK’s largest contractors that was involved in the incident, has sent an appalling and libellous note to rental companies making numerous inaccurate accusations and seeming to blame service company South East Access for the incident. Even stating that the machine was owned by South East Access! The company did in fact visit the machine on the 20th of March, but only to check out a charger malfunction, an LGMG engineer followed up later that day and installed a new part. Nothing to do with the platform.
We will update this item of course, as more information comes in and the parties contacted respond - as we are sure they will. In the meantime we also send our wishes for the two men, and hope they make good progress over the coming days.
Update
While the investigation continues LGMG has issued a letter to its customers suggesting that they stand down their SR2024Es until the cause of the incident is determined. The letter can be seen below.
UPDATE 2
LGMG has confirmed that the deck deisgn on the SR2024E is unique to that model, and very few units have been delivered so far. We have also seen the visuals of the destructive testing it has been carrying out in the week or two since the incident was reported, and so far cannot replicate it.
The HSE is apparently not allowin the company to see the machine, or assist with the investigation, so it is working blind with these tests. In the meantime it has updated its letter to owners of the machine adding:
“As a precautionary measure, we have advised our customers to temporarily suspend
the use of the SR2024E until the root cause of this incident is identified. This suspension applies
strictly to the SR2024E; all other LGMG products continue to operate and can be used as
normal. At this time, only five SR2024E are operational in the UK market.”
“LGMG machines are manufactured to the industry standards set to all MEWPs manufacturers.
Safety and alignment to standards and conformity is paramount. LGMG takes its
responsibilities seriously and awaits the findings of the HSE. LGMG will continue to fully cooperate with the ongoing investigation.”
“Any suggestion that all LGMG machinery is not fit for service or should be quarantined is wholly misguided and influenced by the damaging falsehoods that have circulated in the aftermath of
the incident.”
vertikal editor
The "one person" referred to was one of several individuals that circulated emails that spread the falsehoods, in spite of the fact that they had no idea if what they were spreading was true or not.
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In particular one communication referred was not only totally inacurate as were others, but it also made malicious claims about companies that were totally unconected with what happened, purely based on the false information on social media.
.
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They are at risk of being sued for libel and defamation by from those they slandered.
.
I am not sure why you claim us to be "one sided". Although to be fair, the contractor has refused to speak, and barred its PR team from talking to the press. This does not help thsi situation and is a shame. If that changes however, we will willingly add it to our report.
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Hope that helps you understand - Whispers and facts.
Whispers and facts
Wonder what LGMG have to say after their " manufacturing to standards " quote.
See one sided editor here is determined to still single out one person here in his side note yet 100s stories been flying around.
Makes all his " editorial " items a farce
Whispers and facts
Think editor by single on person out on side note as there's hundreds of stories circulating doesn't really show " impartial journalism "
Doesn't ad anything to this tragedy/ article
vertikal editor
'Just my thoughts', you are totally wrong about others not caring about the operators - I know that for an absolute fact. And it is wrong to assume what others do or do not think.
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I respect your opinion on the publishing of the picture, but disagree for reasons already expressed. And as to "first hand experience" - I too and I am sure others here share such an experience with you, in fact it is this which drives this aspect of our reporting. We absolutely must learn from these incidents to prevent it happening to others.
.
But most of all thank you for sharing your thoughts. They are important.
justmythoughts
Amazing ent it. Not one of these will give the slightest damn about the operators. It will all be tit for tat so it doesn’t drag there company name under. As for an image of the machine you should be disgusted of your selves give some respect to the operators and their families. This is mental torture I speak from first hand.
Felix Dowson
Firstly, And most importantly, I sincerely hope that these men survive this terrible accident and recover from their injuries to a point where they can have quality of life. This accident, whilst tragic, serves as a reminder to all operatives that all machines should be treated with respect. Over the last 30 years of working in this industry both on construction sites and in management I have seen a lot of people just "jump in a machine" or "tick the plant check sheets" without carrying out the inspections properly. If any good thing comes from this (or any accident) it is that people tend to stop and think about making sure their machinery is fit for purpose (not that I'm in any way indicating that this machine was defective) hopefully, soon, we will learn of what has caused this deck to become detached in such a way and if modifications are needed to the LGMG SR2024E then these can be made to make it safe. To hear about accidents like this are horrible for everyone but spare a thought for the people on site who saw this incident. Lets not forget, Everyone deserves to go to work and go home safe and don't forget these men have family and friends before posting comments. Stay safe everyone.
Master of nothing
I just hope the injured parties above all make a full recovery. The investigation hopefully will give us the facts and some good learnings.
mega
We hope, and are sure, that Winvic and the people concerned will get to the bottom of this. Once facts are established i urge ALL work at height professionals to ensure that everyone learns and educated others, as to what could have been done to prevent this happening again. We await the facts, and ask people to think of the people effected above all else.
vertikal editor
I have to disagree with you on the picture issue - one does not want to show hurt people I totally agree, but it is important that what happened in an incident like this is seen, it can really help understand what happened - hiding it does not help improve safety. The photo is factual.
.
As to "Facts should create news stories once they have been established, not speculation and gossip." Once again we totally totally agree with you 'AccessIndustryWorker' which is why a report did not go up yesterday.
.
Our accident reports are aimed partly at stopping the rumour mill, which has been utterly shameless on this one, from people who should know better. If you think we might have some points wrong please do let use know either here or via [email protected] Thank you
AccessIndustryWorker
The image should not be on here, respect needs to be given to those involved and the families. Facts should create news stories once they have been established, not speculation and gossip.
TRay
With all due respect the pictire shouldn’t even be on here. In the early stages of such an incident what possess any one to take a picture of what looks like first aid being administered. Can I ask this picture is removed and give some respect to the families affected by this incident.
vertikal editor
The "one person" referred to was one of several individuals that circulated emails that spread the falsehoods, in spite of the fact that they had no idea if what they were spreading was true or not.
.
In particular one communication referred was not only totally inacurate as were others, but it also made malicious claims about companies that were totally unconected with what happened, purely based on the false information on social media.
.
.
They are at risk of being sued for libel and defamation by from those they slandered.
.
I am not sure why you claim us to be "one sided". Although to be fair, the contractor has refused to speak, and barred its PR team from talking to the press. This does not help thsi situation and is a shame. If that changes however, we will willingly add it to our report.
.
Hope that helps you understand - Whispers and facts.
Whispers and facts
Wonder what LGMG have to say after their " manufacturing to standards " quote.
See one sided editor here is determined to still single out one person here in his side note yet 100s stories been flying around.
Makes all his " editorial " items a farce
Whispers and facts
Think editor by single on person out on side note as there's hundreds of stories circulating doesn't really show " impartial journalism "
Doesn't ad anything to this tragedy/ article
vertikal editor
'Just my thoughts', you are totally wrong about others not caring about the operators - I know that for an absolute fact. And it is wrong to assume what others do or do not think.
.
I respect your opinion on the publishing of the picture, but disagree for reasons already expressed. And as to "first hand experience" - I too and I am sure others here share such an experience with you, in fact it is this which drives this aspect of our reporting. We absolutely must learn from these incidents to prevent it happening to others.
.
But most of all thank you for sharing your thoughts. They are important.
justmythoughts
Amazing ent it. Not one of these will give the slightest damn about the operators. It will all be tit for tat so it doesn’t drag there company name under. As for an image of the machine you should be disgusted of your selves give some respect to the operators and their families. This is mental torture I speak from first hand.
Felix Dowson
Firstly, And most importantly, I sincerely hope that these men survive this terrible accident and recover from their injuries to a point where they can have quality of life. This accident, whilst tragic, serves as a reminder to all operatives that all machines should be treated with respect. Over the last 30 years of working in this industry both on construction sites and in management I have seen a lot of people just "jump in a machine" or "tick the plant check sheets" without carrying out the inspections properly. If any good thing comes from this (or any accident) it is that people tend to stop and think about making sure their machinery is fit for purpose (not that I'm in any way indicating that this machine was defective) hopefully, soon, we will learn of what has caused this deck to become detached in such a way and if modifications are needed to the LGMG SR2024E then these can be made to make it safe. To hear about accidents like this are horrible for everyone but spare a thought for the people on site who saw this incident. Lets not forget, Everyone deserves to go to work and go home safe and don't forget these men have family and friends before posting comments. Stay safe everyone.
Master of nothing
I just hope the injured parties above all make a full recovery. The investigation hopefully will give us the facts and some good learnings.
mega
We hope, and are sure, that Winvic and the people concerned will get to the bottom of this. Once facts are established i urge ALL work at height professionals to ensure that everyone learns and educated others, as to what could have been done to prevent this happening again. We await the facts, and ask people to think of the people effected above all else.
vertikal editor
I have to disagree with you on the picture issue - one does not want to show hurt people I totally agree, but it is important that what happened in an incident like this is seen, it can really help understand what happened - hiding it does not help improve safety. The photo is factual.
.
As to "Facts should create news stories once they have been established, not speculation and gossip." Once again we totally totally agree with you 'AccessIndustryWorker' which is why a report did not go up yesterday.
.
Our accident reports are aimed partly at stopping the rumour mill, which has been utterly shameless on this one, from people who should know better. If you think we might have some points wrong please do let use know either here or via [email protected] Thank you
AccessIndustryWorker
The image should not be on here, respect needs to be given to those involved and the families. Facts should create news stories once they have been established, not speculation and gossip.
TRay
With all due respect the pictire shouldn’t even be on here. In the early stages of such an incident what possess any one to take a picture of what looks like first aid being administered. Can I ask this picture is removed and give some respect to the families affected by this incident.
vertikal editor
Totally agree - the unblurred photograph was uploaded in error - now sorted
Justthoughts
This image could have certain parts blurred/edited given there appears to be an injured party in view... would be a decent thing to do.