The 43-year-old employee, who wished to remain anonymous, received serious crushing, cuts and bruising to his right hand after it was drawn between the rollers of Cotek Papers’ Pagendarm coating machine during cleaning. He was off work for two months recovering from his injuries.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that the cleaning practice in place at the Morton-in-Marsh business, which produces non-stick backing papers for labels, had exposed employees to unnecessary risk at the time of the incident on 2 April 2012.
During normal operation, the machine’s five rollers were protected by fixed guards, but these had to be removed during cleaning, which could take place up to several times a day, exposing employees to the area where paper is drawn into the rollers, known as the ‘nip’.
Due to the machine being particularly old, it did not have the ‘crawl’ function that more modern coaters have which drops the running speed to around 6m/min, so while the machine was not running at full production, it was running at an operating speed, according to HSE inspector Ann Linden.
On 21 January, Cotek Papers was fined £4,000 and ordered to pay £1,483 in costs after pleading guilty at Cheltenham Magistrates Court to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. The legislation puts the onus of health, safety and welfare of staff on the employer during their time at work.
Linden said: "This incident could have been prevented had there been a safe system of work for cleaning the rollers. Cotek Papers clearly failed to ensure the safety of its employees, with painful consequences for the injured worker.
"The law clearly states that employers should take all reasonably practicable steps to protect employees from harm arising from their work. In the case of machinery, moving parts that could cause injury should be guarded or made safe so that people cannot come into contact with them. Non-routine operations such as cleaning or maintenance are not exempt from this requirement."
She added that the machine and its cleaning system were modified "very quickly" by Cotek Papers following the incident.
The older machine could not be configured to have a spray system in place to clean the machine, which would reduce the need for employees to go near the rollers.
Instead, a ‘nip’ guard was placed in front of the area where the two rollers meet, inside the outer safety guard that is removed during cleaning. This permanent guard reduces the risk to employees by restricting access to the ‘nip’ area.
Also, it was found that the emergency stop activated 30 seconds after the button was pressed. Cotek Papers was able to modify this to reduce the time delay to around 8 seconds.
Linden commented that the company’s previous system was "pretty poor" and they have now introduced a new risk assessment procedure and enhanced training for staff.
