UNITED STATES
DEPARTMENT OF LABOR

Employee #1, the driver of a concrete truck owned by CCC, was delivering 7 cubic yards of ready-mix concrete to a job site. He was being guided by the owner of Masonry Plus, the masonry contractor at the site, as he backed the 56,700 lb truck toward a 19.4 ft wide by 33.5 ft long by 7 ft deep excavation. Employee #1 pulled up to within approximately 3 ft of the east edge of the excavation, but when he dismounted he noticed that the side wall of the trench seemed about to fail. He jumped back into the truck and was pulling away when the excavation wall collapsed completely. The guide cried out to another coworker in the trench, who managed to escape uninjured. Employee #1 scrambled to the passenger's side of the cab as his truck plunged into the trench and rolled over, crushing the driver's side. He was trapped, upside down, in the cab until coworkers were able to help him out. No information was provided on his injuries. Subsequent investigation revealed several factors contributing to the accident, in addition to the excessive weight of the truck on the open-faced excavation wall. These included: 1) Employee #1's failure to physically check the conditions, particularly ground stability, before backing his truck alongside the trench; 2) Employee #1's failure to keep the concrete truck at least 7 ft away from the side wall of the excavation; 3) Failure to have a competent person monitoring excavation conditions at the site; and 4) Employee #1's failure to back in at a right angle to the excavation to assure solid ground under the rear wheels (as recommended by National Safety Data Sheet I-617 rev. 82). The excavation had been open only one day prior to the accident and heavy rain the night before likely weakened the side wall. The concrete truck was equipped with attachable chute extensions that could have reached between 12 and 15 ft from the discharge end of the truck. Citations were issued to the general contractor and to the masonry company.