Browsing: Equipment and plant | Page 1

A company accused of failing to reassess risk controls, following "material deviations" from earlier assessments, has avoided prosecution by committing more than $1 million to safety initiatives, including a trial of autonomous inspection vehicles.

• Workplace disasters often linked to ignored concerns: lawyer; and
  
• Incident notification requirements amended in Vic.

• Inquiry examining impact of AI on work intensity and rights;
  
• Workplace security measures targeted by WHS regulator;
  
• Haul trucks have the energy of 948km/h cars, employers warned;
  
• Safety Code remade for solar sector in Qld; and
  
• New Vic safety chief to oversee stone ban and scheme changes.

An employer's work system that required workers to step up onto a platform up to 80 times a day would have involved a breach of duty if an employee had been able to prove the system caused his injuries, a court has found in a case with a seizure and a fall.

A PCBU that was charged with fatality-related WHS breaches, before the case was dropped, appears remarkably lucky to have escaped prosecution, with a coroner identifying numerous safety problems with the machine that caused the death, and finding the killed worker was never provided with proper safety instructions.

A company that failed to ensure a workplace gate was inspected by a qualified engineer, after it was modified, has been fined for exposing other businesses' workers to health and safety risks.

• Electric-shock notification duties clarified; and
  
• New permanent impairment guidelines made for new WA Act.

An employer has been convicted and fined after a worker's leg was crushed by moving equipment with an alarm he couldn't hear over other noise and through his hearing protection. The employer had assessed such an incident as "almost certain" to occur, but didn't take any steps to prevent it.

• COVID odd jobs end in health and safety conviction;
  
• Alarming glut of falls reported by regulator; and
  
• Carbon monoxide warning triggered by forklift death.

A second duty holder has been fined over the death of an 80-year-old workplace visitor in a disused stairwell that posed an obvious risk of falling or entrapment, while a business has been fined over a fatality that followed its failure to identify the qualifications and competencies required for high-risk tasks.