Fatal Decision
Fearing a violent rollover, the victim took off his seat belt and attempted to jump out of the cab to the high side, but somehow ended up below the machine…
Fearing a violent rollover, the victim took off his seat belt and attempted to jump out of the cab to the high side, but somehow ended up below the machine…
Experience was no match for the weight of a dozer when a 70-year-old heavy-equipment mechanic was fatally crushed while lowering a 44,200-pound dozer off a bottle jack.
A surveyor who had worked for the company for five months and operated on ATVs much of that time went missing on a day few employees were at work. After 45 minutes his supervisor attempted to contact him by radio but got no response. After 30 more minutes the super started a search and headed in the same direction with crew members.
The accident: A construction foreman was operating a compaction roller along an incline next to a roadway. The roller articulated unexpectedly, sliding down the incline and tipping onto its side. The operator, who was not wearing a seat belt or hard hat, jumped from the roller. He failed to clear the machine and was struck by the rollover protective structure.
The accident: A paving company employee was transporting a compactor to a jobsite. After parking the tilt bed trailer, he unloaded the compactor by backing the machine down the ramp. The compactor slid off the edge of the ramp and then tipped over. The driver jumped from the machine, but was struck by the ROPS and pinned to the ground.
The accident: An operator was using a hydraulic excavator with a lifting attachment to remove concrete slabs from a bridge. He raised the arm to clear the guardrail, causing the excavator to become unbalanced, tip to the edge of the bridge deck, fall over the side and land 60 feet below in a river.
The accident: A backhoe operator was moving fill dirt, after which other workers spread and compacted the fill. The operator positioned his backhoe too close to the edge of the excavation, and his machine toppled over, striking a compactor operator.
The accident: A 41-year-old roller operator was working on a road extension when his machine rolled sideways down steep embankment. The man was partially ejected, crushed and killed by the machine as it rolled.
The accident: Operating a truck, an operator lost control as he backed toward a steep embankment to dump a load of dirt. The truck began sliding backwards and did at least one complete rotation before coming to a stop. The operator, who was not wearing a seat belt, sustained head and torso injuries and was taken away from the site in critical condition.
The accident: The owner of an excavating company was digging test holes near a gravel pit pond to determine soil composition for a potential construction project. To access the opposite side of the pond, the contractor drove the excavator on the sloped bank next to the water’s edge. The bank sheared away, causing the excavator to tip over into the pond onto the cab…
The accident: The owner of a small construction company that performed excavation work was preparing to backfill a pond. He had transported a dozer to the site on a flatbed trailer, which he parked on a road with a 7-percent grade. While backing the dozer to the rear of the trailer, the machine slipped off the trailer’s down grade edge…
The accident: A worker was operating a compactor on a dirt ramp as part of a highway expansion. While she was backing the unit for another pass, the compactor slipped off the edge of the road surface and tipped, partially throwing her from the machine and pinning her underneath the rollover protective structure.
The accident: After putting his machine in reverse on some banking, a rough terrain operator felt his machine start to tip. Panicking, the operator threw himself from the forklift and was immediately crushed by the tipping machine.
The accident: A crew was installing underground telecommunications cable when the trencher operator started to maneuver the trencher out of a ditch on the edge of roadway. The shoulder of the roadway gave way and caused the machine to roll toward the ditch.
The accident: A crew replacing cracked drainpipes used a backhoe to carry replacement concrete pipes to a utility trench. The backhoe operator lifted several pipes from the bed of a truck onto the loader bucket and began moving across the rubble-covered worksite towards the trench.
The accident: An operator was running a compactor over a newly created gravel shoulder on a road improvement project. In attempting to maneuver the front tires around a road sign, the operator drove the compactor too far off the shoulder and onto a 15-degree slope.
The accident: Two dump truck operators were moving dirt to build an embankment as part of a highway project. The driver of one truck thought his dirt was emptied and pulled forward, tipping onto an adjacent dump truck.