HSE censures MoD for transport fatalities

Prosecutions and Claims |
01.05.2007

The HSE has brought Crown censures against the Ministry of Defence (MoD) after two soldiers were crushed to death by vehicles.

At a hearing on 16 March, the MoD admitted systemic shortcomings in its management of transport risks.

Crown censure is used by the HSE where it believes that, but for Crown immunity from prosecution, it might secure a conviction in the courts.

It brought the two censures against the MoD under Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act.

Corporal Thomas Rees died on 22 May 2003 while he was helping to unload two armoured personnel carriers from a semi-low loader at a ferry terminal at Teesport, Middlesbrough. He was crushed between the two carriers as he stood on the ramp of the low loader.

The HSE's investigation found that the MoD had not provided a safe system of work: it did not properly assess the risks or adequately inform, train and instruct the people involved. It had also failed to act on two previous incidents involving similar unloading operations.

A year after Rees's death, lance-bombardier Robert Wilson died at Albemarle Barracks in Northumberland as he and a colleague prepared to bring a multi-launch rocket system (MLRS) into an internal wash area. While the launcher waited behind a fork-lift truck, Wilson asked the driver to put high revs on so that he could dry his wet clothes at the exhaust vent. As the driver went to do this, the MLRS lurched forward, crushing Wilson against the forklift.    

Though the MoD knew soldiers dried clothes on vehicle exhaust vents, it had failed to stamp out the unsafe practice. It had also modified the vehicle's handbrake linkage without assessing the risks, and had failed to maintain the vehicle adequately.