Bringing Safety to the Heart of your Business                               

Background

An organisation provides transport as part of their services, transporting both ambulant and wheelchair dependant people to various locations with in a city.

The age of those accessing the services range from children to the elderly, the physical ability of those accessing the service, varies from those requiring minimal support to those with high dependency needs.

With a fleet of 30, 15 seater vehicles, each of which carries a daily average of 24 ambulant service users and 4 wheelchair dependant service users, it was estimated that annually 187’000 people are transported, over 31’000 of whom are wheelchair dependant service users.

The Accident

A minibus, carrying elderly passengers to a Day Centre, was involved in a RTA (Road Traffic Accident).

The collision was a head on impact where the other vehicle swerved to avoid a child running into its path, the minibus driver was unable to avoid the collision.

Along with the driver and escort, there were 4 ambulant pensioners seated, and 1 wheelchair user secured using WTORS (Wheelchair Tie Down and Occupant Restraint System).

The safety equipment used to secure the wheelchair user, (WTORS), failed causing the individual to be thrown forward on impact.

The wheelchair user collided with both a seat and another seated passenger. As a result the wheelchair occupant died from the injuries received.

The seated passenger was also injured by the force of the wheelchair user colliding with them, this resulted in a fractured shoulder and lacerations to the leg.  

Report

The police attended the RTA and as required the accident was later reported to both the HSE (Health and Safety Executive), and the MHRA (Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency).

The MHRA, was informed as the equipment is classed as a Medical Device.  

Investigation

The equipment was sent for analysis and it was found to have excessive wear.

The transport manager was able to provide records of adequate and appropriate vehicle maintenance including,

·         A valid vehicle MOT certificate

·         Records of regular vehicle inspection and servicing

·         Vehicle passenger lift servicing  

In terms of the WTORS the transport manager was unable to provide records of formal maintenance.

It was found the organisation had inadequate systems in place to appropriately maintain the safety equipment, as required under the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations.

The transport manager did state that he carries out checks on the equipment but was unable to access funding to formally maintain the equipment using an external specialist company.

To view the information and responses to the above incident please follow the links below.

Accident Summary