Inspection Detail

Inspection: 315775247 - Petersen-Dean Inc Dba Petersendean

Inspection Information - Office: Foster City District Office

Investigation Summary

At approximately 4:27 p.m. on December 13, 2012, Employee #1, a 47-year-old male with Petersen-Dean Inc. dba PetersenDean was part of a crew of workers removing the waste material 'scraps' (broken tiles etc.) from the roof of a single family three story house. There were two levels of the roof to clean; a roof at the garage side (second level) of the house and the top of the third story roof. The foreman stated that after the roofing job was finished by a roofer and the cleaning-crew cleans up the roof. On the day of the incident, the foreman instructed the cleaning crew to clean up the roof. For about for half an hour, the forklift operator witnessed Employee #1 working on the second level of the roof (which was approximately 20 ft. high and 4:12 pitch roof.) Employee #1 was not tied off and was putting debris in the debris-box which was attached to the forks of the forklift and raised up to the roof. The forklift operator had just come back after he emptied the debris-box into a truck and parked the forklift away from where employee #1 was working. The forklift operator stated as he had just raised the debris-box to the third level of the roof for two coworkers to put debris in the box, when he saw something fall down from a corner of his eye while operating the forklift but did not know what it was at that time. The forklift operator stated that he had a partial view of the second level of roof. The forklift operator stated that he could not hear any sound of the fall due to the engine noise of the forklift. However, the two coworkers on the third level of the roof heard noises of falling tiles and/or objects but they were on the back side of the roof and could not see Employee #1 directly. The two coworkers stated they looked down and saw Employee #1 lying on the ground on his back in the middle of the road in front of the garage. A coworker called the Employer and the Employer and summoned Emergency Medical Services. A coworker on the third floor said that he called the forklift operator to bring the two employee's working on the third floor down via the debris box, which he did. The two workers from the third floor noticed Employee #1 was wearing a harness but he was not tied off. Employee # 1 was alive at that time and transported to the Stanford Hospital where he later died from his injuries. A coworker stated that after the incident, he witnessed that both ladders were still secured which were set up by him and another coworker to reach the second and third level of the roofs. The Safety Manager for the Employer stated that he arrived at the job-site the evening after the incident and took some pictures of the scene. The Safety Manager said that he found a rope balled up in a corner of the second level of the roof. This rope was assigned to Employee #1 to use as part of his fall protection.

Keywords: ROOF, CLEANING, LADDER, CONSTRUCTION, ROOFER, FALL, FALL PROTECTION