Review of 2014
May: Heinz fined after engineer has hand sliced off
Worker injuries and health and safety violations have sadly featured a lot on our pages this year, this was one example.
H J Heinz has been fined £50,000 and ordered to pay costs of £9,661 after an engineer severed his hand when it became trapped in an unguarded machine.
A UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found that a protective grate bolted on top of a slurry pump to prevent access, was absent, enabling the engineer to reach into dangerous parts of the machine including the screw auger.
HSE said the guard had possibly been absent for some time from the Norfolk Plant.
A Heinz statement sent to us said: "Safety is always our first concern. Although a safe system for maintenance work was in place further measures have been adopted to ensure that such a regrettable accident could not happen again."