Truck Driver killed by delivery trolley

[juddian]

Poor fellow should have been looking forward to putting his feet up, not this.

Cages loaded with heavy tinned type goods a horrible unstable things, lots of people been hurt by them over the years, easy enough to get killed by one if thats the case here.

Bad enough putting em on the tail lift, but its getting them off thats dangerous, bloody pot holes verges kerbs everything and those silly little wheels that get stuck trying to climb a matchstick.

Trouble is old school fellers probably try their best to stop a cage falling, the younger blokes have more bloody sense if its going over just get out the way and let it.

Used to have one particular drop on Kwik Save in South London, reverse down a really steep incline to the loading dock, trouble is with a curtain sider (old as the hills still on steel springs) you could only secure each row of three cages and the strips to stop the other cages rolling didn’t, bloody frightening it was you daren’t take your eyes off the load for a second.

I cured the it for meself i used to take an extra Anderson lead to reach the tail lift plug and drop the trailer right down to its knees but leave the tractor pick up ramps just under the front edge for safety, this left the trailer level, but this should have been standard practice not something a few scabby old drivers found out to save themselves.

[peterm]

Poor bugger. R.I.P.

[pat_hasler]

Poor man, poor family
I used to always strap every row in if they were empties or not. I did a day of freelance work for a similar company in 1998 while I was on a 12 week holiday from the show work in winter, there was never anyone available to help unload and one Pakitani store owner expected me to actually stack stuff on his shelves, needless to say he ended up stacking his own shelf. I also did some days freelance for Budgens and one day had a whole load of cages for a store in North London with 6 cages on the front for Watford. Nobody in the North London store was available to help me unload in the street (the loading bay was blocked by an inconsiderate parker), I refused to unload in the street and took the load back to Wellingborough “Where’s the signed paperwork for the 6 cages you took to Watford ?” asked the woman in traffic.
“With the cages on the trailer, if you think I’m taking 90% of a load off to get to 6 cages you are mistaken”
Never got asked back again

[dieseldoforme]

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In light of this sad incident, several of you have posted about the dangers of handling roller cages.

Has any one of you contacted the H&SE with your concerns ?

hse.gov.uk/contact/workplace-complaints.htm
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[tgb]

After reading all your comments online, I felt I had to join and add my own comments on this matter, I have worked with Keith (the driver in question) for a number of years and he was a cracking bloke
He was due for retirement on the 11th December but agreed to stay on for a couple of months to help out with the busy season. Poor bugger, you do the company a favour and this is what you get.
Overloaded cages with many defects, but they dont care they are loaded with an EPT by another spotty polish gimp in the warehouse, rammed into the back of the trailer and in some cases not restrained. I have delivered to this shop myself and its always the same, no one there will help, they just stand and watch you
The TM or MIRROR MAN as hes known is as much use as a chocolate fire guard, any concerns you take to him are ignored (all you get is I’ll look into it (hence the name)) yeah he has a class 1 but its just for show and probably out of date by now
I hope HSE go to town on him and the company.

[james_bateman2]

Hi TGB
So sad to read that about your mate Keith (rip).

As you say,I hope the HSE go to town on the TM and Co too.

[voodoo1]

Think this just shows the state of transport, when companies willing to risk people’s lives enabling them to undercut a second man company who do things legit.

[msgyorkie]

voodoo1:
Think this just shows the state of transport, when companies willing to risk people’s lives enabling them to undercut a second man company who do things legit.

+1
Its like we are going back in time to the Victorian times and losing all our hard fought for rights!

[own_account_driver]

This incident is a really sad tragedy.

Similar to other posts above I’ve had to improvise making wheel chocks for roll cages out of bits of broken pallet and the like when on this sort on work. It’s far from ideal health and safety wise but, self-tip tail-lift work, always has been what it is, it isn’t some sudden return to Victorian times.

In an ideal world you’d drive from the bay in one well lit yard to the bay in another, and never leave the cab, but it’s not going to be like that any time soon and when it is driver’s wages will be even less than they are now.

Things like the large modern cantilever tail-lifts on pallet multi-drop with a hand rail all round them are great from a working at height point of view but then no good for taking off the side over the kerb on to the pavement.

Small things that I think should be changed are:

Column tail-lifts, with flaps on all three sides, only used for roll cages and never cantilever tail-lifts.
Get rid of those cages which have a fold down shelf halfway up, they’re an invitation for top heavy loading.
Stop loading with electric pump trucks and more effort should be put in by picking staff to ensure the wheels aren’t knackered before they start picking into a cage. Too often I used to find cages with a wheel missing in the load and without the electric picking trucks they wouldn’t have been able to do that.

[truckulent]

Absolutely disgraceful this man was allowed to do this. RIP to another good man. These companies allowing this need shutting down.

Time drivers stopped saying yes and started saying ■■■■ off…

[santa]

I suppose we all have a story - here’s mine:

When I first went back on the agency in the 90s I was mostly doing artic work on chilled. One day they phoned me up to help out because they were in trouble with the Coop contract in Halesowen. They paid my exes so I got up there as fast as I could to find a loaded 4 wheeler ready to go and full of frozen.

I had never worked for the Coop before and never done frozen, but off I set with three shops to deliver to. The first one was OK except that I found that the shop staff expected me to unload and drag the cages into the store which annoyed me.

At the second store I was on a slope towards the back, and there was a heavy cage full of meat stuck. The floor was really slippery and it was hard to get a good grip, but I heaved and it suddenly came out just as my feet went from under me. I was flat on my back and winded and only just managed to roll out of the way of the moving cage, which trundled down the truck, across the TL and crashed on its side onto the concrete.

When I got my breath back and made it to the back of the truck I found no one cared about me but only about the damaged goods. I didn’t speak but closed the truck up and drove it back to the depot. I filled in an accident report and went home, but never heard another word about it. I refused to go back there after that.

[nsmith1180]

RIP to Keith, a shocking accident. But even with the right gear, it is easy to see how it can happen.

I have literally just finished working Night Network for Vauxhall, (handed the keys to the truck and the security pass in at the gatehouse at 1100 this morning,) and despite the fact that both Vauxhall and ND have the right kit for the job, it is still a serious accident waiting to happen.

The Roll cages are about six, maybe seven inches shorter than the width of the trailer, so spinning them around on the back of the trailer is asking for crush/pinch injuries to your fingers, even with gloves. The brakes on the roll cages are shot to hell, even the brand new ones. Car dealers are notoriously bad for potholes away from the forecourt.

Pallets are restricted to less than 600kg, but only after one of our guys fell off the back of the truck trying to get a pallet of batteries off at a daytime drop, and shattered his heel. He has been off for 6ish months and is showing no sign of returning to work. Roll cages are supposed to be to similar weights but Vauxhall pack em and seal them, our boys load em with a fork truck, then guide them downhill to their final resting place on the trailer. Which is fine, until you are on your own trying to get em off the full height canter leaver tail lift in the ■■■■■■■ rain at three o’clock in the morning. Then they get heavy.

Nine times out of ten, its ok for a one person to tip. The tenth time though, you are chasing three rollers with shot brakes around the trialer when you are trying to get one on to the tail lift. When you catch it, its overloaded and usually looks ok. (Vauxhall have a habit of loading a couple of levels of batteries, behind the cage liners, then loading air filters on top so it looks light.)

The problem here is that nine times out of ten its OK and supplying a passenger for the one time out of ten that you get one overloaded cage out of nineteen is massively cost prohibitive. Not every job is safe and even if you had two people, you would legitimately use them to make your life easier so the chances are they would be in the dealer lock up while you were on the back of the trailer and not available immediately if something happened.

Still it would be nice to have someone to call for help if you fall of the tail lift and break you leg at 0230 in the arse end of Northampton.

[rob22888]

To add to the recent post re: requirements for cage work. You should also always have adjustable air suspension so you can level the wagon out when unloading on slopes. Still lots of cage work done in rigids without this, utter pain in the arse and ■■■■ right dangerous having to contend with potentially several tons of gear wanting to runaway.

[madbaz]

Here’s a couple of pics from when I threw my toys out when doing a days agy for Londis:

It’s amazing how there’s never any staff available to help at the delivery point, I did handball some into another cage inside the store instead of trying out the dodgy ramp until I had a bright idea I moved to the front of the store and started bringing the last few in through the customer entrance, what was really amazing was how fast the store manager appeared to remonstrate. I doubt I was ever going to be asked back, I think I made myself quite clear that I wouldn’t go back at any price.

[nsmith1180]

rob22888:
To add to the recent post re: requirements for cage work. You should also always have adjustable air suspension so you can level the wagon out when unloading on slopes. Still lots of cage work done in rigids without this, utter pain in the arse and ■■■■ right dangerous having to contend with potentially several tons of gear wanting to runaway.

Thats all good, but you get out, level up, tip three cages totaling two tons or so and the unit has risen, putting you on a slope again.

[wiretwister]

nsmith1180:
Still it would be nice to have someone to call for help if you fall of the tail lift and break you leg at 0230 in the arse end of Northampton.

My fear is being unconscious or unable to reach your phone. You could die waiting for someone to give [zb]. In the time I’ve been at my current place we’ve had 2 guys die of heart attack (1 in Hammersmith, minutes away from one of the best cardiac units in the country) in the trailers and at least 2 others collapse but survive, 1 in the last year.

[skipman]

Update on this
thestar.co.uk/news/local/dev … -1-5278905

Very sad for the family.Two previous accidents in the last 12 months.

[cheekymonkey]

DHL haven`t sent his widow a letter of condolence. Well, a stamp is about 50p. And margins are low. I mean…thats why they do a two man job with one man.
Everythings down to pounds shillings and pence these days. Its very sad.

I actually thought I might have been a bit of a softy when I told the agency I would never do this work again, but this has made me feel my judgement was sound. There`s more important things than money.

Compare…
I`ve mentioned this case to the DHL lads in Spennymoor and they are all in the dark over it.

When I worked for Tesco in the 80`s a guy was killed in a bad road accident and there was an immediate massive effort throughout the distribution network nationwide to raise money for his widow. It was humbling to be part of it. A collective grief and real concern for a fellow worker.

Kieth will sadly be forgotten by all, except those closest to him, very quickly. That, my friends is the way of things these brutal days.

I may be getting close to retirement, but Im glad Ive seen the best of not only road transport but human nature as well.

Sorry for being a bit down.

[the_boggart]

Winseer:
Issues here:

Why are we working at that age, and why on our own with street drops?
Bet the firm won’t be looking after the bereaved family - “All sub-contracted, not our responsibility” they’ll say.

RIP driver.

When I worked for Fashionflow JRL at Stakehill we had a couple of Agency Drivers who were BOTH 79 years old. and both of them did handball loading of 44ft trailers at Lambert&Howarth Finsly gate Burnley. this was in 2003.

[sadspouse]

As the widow of the truck driver killed by delivery trolley I have noted some of the coments you have made,my husband worked for DHL not the best in the world to work for. Keith was a fit man for 65 and puulled and pushed cages around for many years,He did not have a heart attack as some of you think , he was killed by the cage falling on him and crushing his chest he died from crush injurys. yes he was old shool but he was also awear of the saftey side of things if 3 things had been put in place he would not have died, 1 the shop for no safty employed 2 the firm for not checking the health & safety for delivering,3 the wearehouse for not checking the cages where safely loaded, many of you know this to be true and I bet some of you have had some close call with thease cages!! and survied my husband dint.If you want to change things then report them to the health & safety officers they will act on it they have been fantastic with what happend to keith and are keeping me informed they are there to help you, use them or you will never get things changed ,i also want to thank all the truck drivers at DHL scunthorpe dept for there support and what they have done for me THANK YOU LADS