Worker was fatally injured after a garbage truck tipped over
Ontario employer Norfolk Disposal Services Limited has been fined $160,000 after one of its workers died in the line of duty.
Following a guilty plea in the Provincial Offences Court, Simcoe, the employer was also tasked to pay a 25 per cent victim fine surcharge as required by the Provincial Offences Act. The surcharge is credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.
The incident happened on April 11, 2022, when a worker was driving a waste collection truck.
The truck the worker used can be operated from the right side, so that the driver can exit the cab, collect waste and reenter the cab all from the curb side of the vehicle. Drivers must stand to operate the vehicle from this side.
On the day of the incident, the worker was following a route they had driven before when the truck abruptly crossed the road and entered the opposite ditch. The truck tipped over and the worker, who was operating the vehicle from the right side, was fatally injured.
A Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development investigation found that the training provided by the company to new hires included rules for operating waste collection vehicles, videos of defensive driving techniques and in-class tests.
Experienced drivers also provided in-truck instruction and feedback for two to three weeks before a new hire was cleared to operate on their own. However, trainers did not have a checklist to confirm and record that new drivers met all the required competencies before being authorized to operate the vehicle.
Workers were not consistently trained to wear seat belts or close the right-side door while operating the waste collection trucks and they were not trained on the operator’s manual of the vehicle, which states that the truck should only be operated from the right side when the seat belt is used.
According to the Ontario government, some company drivers operated the truck with the door open, and not all drivers wore seatbelts consistently, because of the extra time it took to enter and exit the vehicle between stops. Also, while the company had a 32 km/h speed limit for operating the truck from the right side, not all drivers adhered to it.
And the waste disposal company did not have a system in place to ensure that drivers received information or instruction on how to safely operate waste collection trucks from the right side.
“The company failed to provide information, instruction and supervision to a worker to ensure they were able to operate the vehicle safely, as required by section 25(2)(a) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, contrary to section 66(1) of the Act,” said the Ontario government.
