A Stirlingshire firm has been fined more than £1.1 million for health and safety breaches that left two men seriously injured.
A contractor working for Cowie-based West Fraser Europe Ltd plunged four metres from a rusting gantry, just months after another employee was dragged into machinery.
A sheriff said both men had been placed at risk of death.
The seven-figure fine follows a £2 million financial penalty in 2022, after the company accepted responsibility for an incident that left a worker with fatal burns.
‘Lessons have been learnt’
The company, previously known at Norbord Europe, admitted breaches of health and safety regulation last month.
It pled guilty to failing to take measures to prevent access to dangerous parts of the machinery by not having a guard on the inspection hatch of the biomass bunker between January 2018 and January 2020, resulting in Sean Gallagher’s severe injury and permanent impairment.
The business further pled guilty to failing to ensure safe access to an elevated gantry in July 2020 resulting in the severe injury of David McMillan.
Lawyers said immediate action had since been taken in both cases to prevent a repeat.
Sheriff O’Mahoney said: “Both offending incidents on the indictment highlighted particular points where the system failed.
”However, lessons have been learnt, and the company has gone on to implement a number of safety improvement measures.
“These include inspections, upgrades to equipment and conducting extensive audits to structural assets.”
Worker tried to resolve bunker issue
The court heard that in the January incident a fault was detected in the biomass bunker and Mr Gallagher, in trying to resolve it, became entangled in a screw mechanism and suffered a broken leg and needed skin grafts and a surgical frame fitted.
The sheriff said: “No reason could be advanced as to why Mr Gallagher had departed from the safety procedures during the second incident.
”Nonetheless, guilt was accepted given that the employee had been able to access the bunker without it being properly isolated.”
In July 2018, Mr McMillan had been on the roof helping install scaffolding and made his way along a gantry towards a ladder to descend.
As he jumped down on to the steel plates which make up the floor section of the gantry, one of them gave way and fell to the ground, taking him with it.
He was taken to Queen Elizabeth University hospital in Glasgow, where he was treated for a shattered heel, broken ankle, fractures to his elbow and ribs, multiple fractures to his vertebrae and a collapsed lung.
He underwent surgery and was in hospital for almost three weeks.
Sheriff O’Mahoney said: “In relation to charge two, counsel highlighted that the gantry had been in place for many years and was believed to be redundant.
”In those circumstances the gantry should either have been inspected and maintained or dismantled and removed.
“It was accepted, with the benefit of hindsight, that there was some confusion between departments as to where responsibility for the structure lay.”
Calculating a fine
In determining a fine, the sheriff accepted that the firms profits had been inflated in 2020 and 2021 due to the demand for wood in the pandemic.
He said the firm’s culpability for the first incident was low, but that Mr Gallagher’s injuries were “serious and life impairing”.
He said Mr Gallagher’s actions should not be considered contributory in a criminal case, and that he had to assess what the employee was able to do as a result of the failings.
Sheriff O’Mahoney said culpability was greater in the second incident and that although Mr McMillan was seriously injured, other workers were also put at risk
Sheriff O’Mahoney fined the firm a total of £1,148,100.
The fine follows the company being fined £2.125 million in 2022 following an incident in which a worker suffered fatal burns.
George Laird suffered full-thickness burns to 90% of his body after a fire hose was used to try and clear hot ash from the bottom of a combustion chamber.
This caused an explosive effect whereby Mr Laird was covered in scalding water, steam and hot ash.
A court heard the burns were so severe Mr Laird had no chance of recovery.
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