04/11/2010 - Tyre firm fined over worker injury
A Wolverhampton tyre company has been fined £18,250 after a teenage apprentice fractured his skull while maintaining machinery.
Goodyear Dunlop, whose head office is in Erdington, Birmingham, was also ordered to pay £4,807 in costs at Wolverhampton Magistrates' Court for breaching health and safety regulations after one of its maintenance team struck his head at the company's Stafford Road, Bushbury, Wolverhampton site.
The court heard how, Karl Illidge, 17, was working with two other mechanical maintenance engineers trying to fix a tyre press when the internal bladder of the press re-energised and burst. Mr Illidge tried to get out of the way of the tyre press' lid, which was blown off with great force, but hit his head on nearby equipment while doing so.
Health and Safety Executive inspector, Amarjit Kalay, said: "This incident was entirely preventable had there been a safe system in place to ensure that services to the press had been isolated prior to the start of the maintenance work. It is also clear that the maintenance team were insufficiently trained to carry out the necessary diagnostic work on this piece of machinery."
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