Lack of adequate guarding on textile machine causes finger crush injury

Lawton Yarns Ltd., of Dewsbury was fined £5,648 (inc. costs) after a worker was caught in an unguarded part of a machine.

The circumstances were:

• The company bought a miniature carding machine second-hand in 2000 and fitted guards.
• The guards did not cover access to the carding rollers from underneath.
• The company had several carding machines and the risks of access from the underside are well known within the industry.
• A worker reached under the rollers to reach some fibres, was caught and drawn in
• Three fingers were badly crushed.

The HSE Inspector said:

“Lawton Yarns’ key failing was not to assess the risks adequately in the first place. The assessment is the platform for informing you of the controls and measures you need. If the former is lacking, then so are the controls. In this case, a vital risk was missed and an employee now has to live with the serious consequences. The incident demonstrates that a risk assessment is not an administrative, paper exercise. If companies do not do it properly in the first place, they will always struggle to put in place proper safeguards.”