Inspection Detail

Inspection: 315774653 - Walter & Wolf

Inspection Information - Office: Foster City District Office

Investigation Summary

At 4:00 a.m. on August 3, 2012, two employees arrived at the Nano Scale Science & Engineering building in Palo Alto, California. Both employees were stone masons by trade and their assignment was to pick up a concrete slab that had been removed by other employees in order to create a door opening to the building. Upon arrival at the site, the two employees went to the southeast part of the building in order to move the mobile cherry picker that would carry the concrete slab. That mobile cherry picker was delivered there the day prior. The mobile cherry picker had wheels weighing approximately 500 to 600 pounds, and was on the opposite side of the building from the location of the concrete slab. The two employees tied a practically new yellow harness type strap all the way around it. When the employees were moving this contraption, Employee #2 was in the back pushing it forward and Employee #1 was in the front pulling on the yellow strap. At the halfway point of the path and near a lighted fountain, the two employees went up a very small incline, yet the ground was almost flat. One employee states that the yellow strap buckle snapped off while the other employee states that the yellow strap got somehow unraveled or unwound from the mobile cherry picker. At approximately 4:15 a.m. the momentum of Employee #1 pulling this mobile cherry picker carried him forward. Employee #1 fell forward and landed on concrete with his right shoulder. Employee #1 fractured his right clavicle and was hospitalized over 24 hours.

Keywords: CONCRETE SLAB, FRACTURE, SHOULDER, FALL