Falls and electrocutions most common cause of powered access deaths

Over the whole five-year period 2016-2020, the most common causes of fatal incidents were falls from the platform and electrocutions, both accounting for 23% of deaths, followed by entrapments (19%), MEWP overturns/tip-overs (12%), MEWPs being struck by another machine or vehicle (6%) or hit by falling object(s) (5%).

In the early days of the accident reporting project, which launched in 2012-13, the majority of reports were received from IPAF’s UK membership. But reports are now coming in from 19 countries across the most recent two years of data gathering, and more than 25 countries worldwide in the past five years.

Brian Parker, IPAF head of safety & technical, said: “One thing that we all agree on is we must now focus on areas we know we need more data from; this means gathering more information about near misses – we are getting comprehensive reporting of serious injuries and deaths but need more reports of the seemingly innocuous mistakes that might have led to a serious outcome but didn’t.

“Near misses are important in understanding trends and preventing serious accidents in future. We hope that direct access to the reporting portal from the newly launched IPAF ePAL mobile app for operators and supervisors will empower more people to record these sorts of incident – quickly, easily and anonymously if so preferred.

“Likewise, we are getting some reports about mast climbing work platforms (MCWPs) and construction hoists, but our database is not quite complete enough regarding these machine types to draw meaningful statistical conclusions. We will work with our members and relevant technical committees to improve reporting from the MCWP sector to enable us to give useful insights into key accident trends in future.”