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A SHERIFF in Dundee has criticised as "highly dangerous" lorry loading procedures at a soft drinks factory following an accident in which a 35-year-old Stirling man died.
Sheriff Edward Bowen was issuing his findings at Dundee Sheriff Court following a fatal accident inquiry early in December into the death of Mr Thomas Dennis McLean, of St Ninian, Stirling.
The judgment says Mr McLean died in Dundee Royal Infirmary on August 22 from injuries received when he fell from the top of a load on a trailer unit at Mari-Mate Ltd, in Brunel Road, Dundee.
Mr McLean was employed by John Fleming, haulage contractor, of Causewayhead, Stirling. Death was caused by brain contusions and a fractured skull. Sheriff Bowen held that the system of working at the time of the accident was "unsafe and defective."
The load on which Mr McLean was standing or walking on at the time was about 14ft above ground level and consisted of empty plastic lemonade bottles, banded together on pallets with plastic film and covered in cardboard.
This did not provide a level and firm walking surface. The sheriff also said that the pallets were not tightly bound together and that gaps existed between them through which Mr McLean could easily have placed a foot. More than half of the load was also covered by a tarpaulin, making it impossible for Mr McLean to see what he had been standing on.
The judgment said Mr McLean had collected a load of empty lemonade bottles from MenMate and was in the process of covering this with tarpaulins. He was lifted to the top of the load in the forks of a forklift truck.
Sheriff Bowen said this did not appear to be a particularly satisfactory method of gaining access to the top of the load. "Once on top of the load, there is no doubt whatsoever in my view that what the deceased was doing was unsafe," he said.
Sheriff Bowen said he was not in a position to identify any precise cause of the fall, although he agreed with a submission by a lawyer of Mr McLean's widow that it was reasonable to infer that he fell simply because of the nature of the load.
He recommended that if the system had not already been changed, then it should be.