Balfour Beatty fined £600,000 after worker hit by excavator

Balfour Beatty Civil Engineering has been fined £600,000 after a worker was killed when he was struck by the body of a wheeled excavator.

The accident took place when Balfour Beatty was principal contractor on the construction of the Third Don Crossing in Aberdeen.

Aberdeen Sheriff Court heard that between 4 January 2016 and 13 January 2016 Balfour Beatty Civil Engineering Limited failed to ensure that the safe system of work for refuelling of all plant and equipment was fully implemented at the construction site.

As a consequence of that failure, on 13 January 2016, the worker was struck and killed by a wheeled excavator which was slewing after being refuelled.

An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that refuelling of plant and equipment was identified as a high-risk activity by the principal contractor who had created a task briefing document detailing a safe system of work and had risk assessed the activity. But the HSE found that while it was evident that the procedures existed in documentary format, the safe system of work and its control measures had not been fully implemented at the construction site.

Balfour Beatty Civil Engineering of Churchill Place, Canary Wharf, London pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 13(1) of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 and has been fined £600,000.

HSE principal inspector, Niall Miller said: “This was a tragic and wholly avoidable incident, caused by the failure of the civil engineering company to implement safe systems of work, and to ensure that health and safety documentation was communicated and control measures followed.”