Plant Fined £30,000 After Worker Loses Three Fingers

An employee at a meat processing plant in Prestwick lost three fingers
when a machine he was attempting to repair started up. The owners of
the company have been convicted of failing to have a safe isolation
procedure in place for the machinery.

The incident happened in June 2008 when employee Steven Glass was
working on an Endoline tape packaging machine which had been under
repair. When the machine wouldn't work he tried to fix it. As the
machine could not be properly isolated to prevent accidental
operation, it started and subsequently trapped three of his fingers,
which were amputated. One of his fingers was successfully reattached.

Since Mr Glass' accident, the company has been taken over hand has
seen significant improvements in regards to health and safety.

On 2nd July 2009 at Ayr Sherriff Court, Belcher Food products Ltd of
Prestwick, pleaded guilty to breaching Sections 2(1); 2 (2) and 33 (1)
(a) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and was fined £30,000.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has stressed the importance of
ensuring machinery is capable of being isolated to prevent operation
and to ensure employees are given sufficient training, instruction and
supervision.

Helen Diamond, HSE Investigating Inspector is now warning companies of
the importance of maintaining machinery and ensure that it is properly
guarded: "This serious accident was entirely foreseeable and
preventable. The company themselves had identified a large number of
serious faults with their machinery well before this accident, yet
little was done to rectify these faults. The company also failed to
follow the advice of our inspectors.

"It is vital for the safety of all employees that companies ensure
machinery is properly maintained and that systems are in place to
ensure it cannot accidentally be operated when under repair. Our
investigations showed that it was normal practice for employees to
repair their own machines."

A year previous to the accident, the court heard that an electrical
inspection of their premises identified 866 faults with the electrics
and wiring system, 200 of these regarded as most urgent. Little or no
work had been done to correct these faults by the time of the
accident.

HSE inspectors visited the plant 3 months prior to the accident and
informed the company that they have a procedure in place to ensure
machinery could be properly isolated while being prepared. This had
not been carried out at the time of the accident.