Insecure joist hangers caused floor fall

Prosecutions and Claims |
01.03.2007

A house-building firm has been fined £18,000 and £4,210 costs after four bricklayers fell 2.4m when the first floor of a two-storey house collapsed. Workers likened the fall, which brought concrete blocks raining down on them, to being inside a lift dropping quickly down its shaft. 

The incident happened on 11 October 2004 at a Harron Homes site in Kirkby, Merseyside. The floor, which was supported by joists fixed to one side of the building by metal joist hangers, collapsed under the weight of the four men and a stack of concrete blocks.

HSE investigating inspector Robert Hodkinson told HSW that the hangers were not adequately fixed to the brickwork.

Harron had no formal safe system of work or written method statement for using the hangers. The permanent site agent had identified the issue and workers were propping floors from underneath. But when a stand-in agent came to take over, there was no proper hand-over, no paperwork and no oral communication. The collapse happened on the day the permanent agent returned to the site. He heard a crash on the plot and found the hangers had given way and no one had propped the floor from underneath.   

At Huyton Magistrates' Court on 26 January, Harron Homes (North West) pleaded guilty to failing to protect non-employees under Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act.