Abstract: On August 18, 2002, Employee #1, a process technician, was setting up a mold change in a plastic injection molding machine. The product required two strokes of the platen. The first stroke would make the part, after which the robot arm would pick up and move the part to a different place on the mold face, whereupon the second stroke would complete the product. Employee #1 was in the danger zone between the mold halves while dialing in the final placement of the robotic arm. When he completed the set-up, he followed normal procedure and sent the robot arm out of the mold to the home position. The machine sensed that the robotic arm had cleared the mold area, and it cycled, crushing and killing Employee #1. The machine had been inadvertently left in auto mode during this final touch-up procedure, and the safety controls had been bypassed.