A Dandenong South food recycling company has been convicted and fined $200,000 after a young worker was crushed by steel doors of a processing machine.
Branin Recycles Pty Ltd pleaded guilty in Dandenong Magistrates’ Court to three workplace safety charges.
In December 2019, the 21-year-old worker tried to clear a blockage underneath two steel-access doors which opened downwards. Each weighed up to 100 kilograms.
The steel bolt holding the doors closed then unexpectedly failed and the doors opened with about 200 kilograms force, striking the worker in the head and covering her in out-of-date bread.
A fellow worker had to remove the bread to prevent her from suffocating, the court heard.
The victim was in a coma for a month and in hospital for six months, with severe injuries including brain damage.
She was left with blindness in one eye, slight impairment in the other, partial deafness, diminished senses of smell and taste, nerve damage and permanent scarring.
Still undergoing rehabilitation, she has been unable to return to work.
The company processed out-of-date food to create cattle fodder using large and complex machinery designed and made by the company’s director, the court heard.
WorkSafe investigators found the bolt holding the drum doors was prone to fail and break due to the rotating forces.
The court found it was reasonably practicable for Branin Recycles to provide a safe system of work, such as a mechanism to open the doors remotely as well as adequate guarding.
WorkSafe executive director Narelle Beer said it was an incident waiting to happen.
“It is just heartbreaking that a young worker has suffered such traumatic and lifelong injuries simply because she went to work and did the job she was told to do,” Dr Beer said.
“It’s up to employers to ensure all machinery is properly guarded, that there are safe systems of work in place and that workers have been appropriately trained to operate and maintain machinery safely.”
