A Co Tyrone company that grows mushrooms has been fined more than £70,000 after an employee’s leg became trapped in a machine and later had to be amputated.
Luka Ilic’s right leg was caught by the rotating blades of a mushroom filling machine and became stuck in the device’s moving parts on 16 October 2019.
Mr Ilic, who was 29 at the time, was working as part of a team of three at Howden Enterprises Ltd, trading under the name Hughes Mushrooms.
The team were cleaning the machine at the firm’s premises in Holme-on-Spalding-Moor, East Yorkshire.
The father-of-two climbed onto the machine, which is used to prepare and fill compost in growing trays, to remove the last remaining parts of the compost.
The machine was then turned on, leading to Mr Ilic’s leg being caught by the rotating blades in the mixing axle and becoming trapped.
His leg was later amputated below the knee at hospital.
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Mr Ilic, who lives in Hull, had only been working in his team for nine days when the incident occurred.
A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found that Howden Enterprises Ltd failed to adequately assess the operation of the filling machine, in particular the cleaning of the machine.
The firm was also found to have failed to ensure there was robust isolation and safe operating procedures in place and followed.
Howden Enterprises Ltd, of Trew Mount Road, Dungannon, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.
The company was fined £73,333.00 and ordered to pay £7,522.60 in costs at Hull and Holderness Magistrates Court on Wednesday.
HSE inspector Louise Redgrove said: “The importance of a suitable and sufficient risk assessment which reflects all actual practical activities cannot be underestimated.
“It is vital to ensure there are effective systems of work and physical controls which are implemented, supervised and used by all those involved.
“This incident could have easily been avoided with a robust isolation procedure and padlock for each worker involved.”
