AN engineering company has been fined £9,000 after a Stourbridge employee suffered a punctured lung and broken bones when he fell while dismantling a recycling cabin.

The incident happened at Telford Way Industrial Estate in Kettering, where Ebbsfleet Engineering Services Ltd had been employed to dismantle a recycling line.

Northampton Magistrates Court heard that part of the line included a cabin built on four-metre high metal stilts, the walls of which had already been taken off to allow for the removal of the hopper bins inside.

Ian Cartwright, aged 45, was helping to lift the hoppers from the cabin floor, when one moved unexpectedly and knocked him off balance and he fell over the edge to the concrete floor below.

He punctured a lung, broke eight ribs, a shoulder and his collarbone and was off work for four months while he recovered.

A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found that although operatives were using harnesses and lanyards when stationary and working, nothing was in place to prevent them from falling when moving around the floor and edges of the cabin area, for example edge protection or a safety running line.

The firm, of Whitewall Road, Rochester, Kent, was fined £9,000 with costs of £859 after pleading guilty to breaching Regulation 6(3) of the Work at Height Regulations 2005.

After the hearing HSE inspector Sam Russell said: “This was an avoidable incident and demonstrates the importance of risk assessments being carried out and appropriate control measures put in place.

“There should be no complacency when it comes to planning high risk activity such as this.”