Irish Cement fined €225,000 over Platin accident

Irish Cement was fined €225,000 at Trim Circuit Court over a workplace accident at its factory at Platin near Drogheda which left a man with life changing injuries three years ago.

The court heard the accident could have been prevented if the company had not put plans to concrete a tipping area on the long finger.

Evidence in the case was heard last October and adjourned for sentence.

At the earlier hearing the company's CEO Jack Dalton admitted that it had failed to ensure that the petroleum coke tipping area was a safe place of work resulting in the injury of a truck driver on 17th April 2018 and failed to carry out a risk assessment on the area for a person other than employee.

Health and Safety Authority inspector Roddy Molloy told prosecuting counsel Carl Hanahoe BL that a contract driver was tipping a load of petroleum coke to be used in the factory's furnace when his articulated truck toppled over as the ground was uneven.

The inspector said the yard was natural ground and after rain, coke that was spread on it to level the surface became slurried hiding potholes and ruts.

An employee was deployed to flatten this area after heavy rainfalls and a number of workers and drivers had alerted the company to the problem the court heard.

Mr Molloy said the company had been aware of problems there as trucks had frequently become stuck on the surface.

He added that the remedy was to lay down a concrete surface but while this work had been budgeted for, for a number of years it had not been done.

A number of managers had viewed the matter as an environmental issue and an operational issue rather than one of health and safety Judge Martina Baxter was told.

The court also heard the HSA had not been notified about the accident by the company on the day but was later notified by the driver's employer.

In a victim impact statement read by Mr Hanahoe the truck driver said that when his truck toppled over he had been thrown from one side of the cab to the other leaving him with extensive injuries including broken collar bone, sternum and ribs.

His injuries left him unable to work which placed him and his wife under severe financial pressure.

The court heard that compensation had since been paid by the man’s employer and Irish Cement and the tipping area had since been concreted over.

A defence barrister told Judge Martina Baxter the company accepted its blame and apologised for the accident and injuries caused but he added it was not a case where it had been breaking the law to maximise profits.

The barrister described the compensation as a concrete expression of the company's remorse.

At a resumed hearing Judge Baxter said the company had known about the problem by having an employee there to flatten the ground after heavy rain but “failed to heed the warnings of those on the ground.”

“It was a conscious decision to ignore a real risk.”

“This was an accident waiting to happen”, said the judge before imposing fines totalling €225,000 and awarding costs of €5,046.