Posted By Jane Smith I will keep this as brief as possible. I am interested in people's opinion on this one, but only so I can learn more. Background: I thought an occurence was reportable under RIDDOR, my lecturer at Uni thought it was reportable. My bosses did not think it was reportable. What do you think? An employee attempted to lift machinery from the floor. The machinery was still bolted to the floor. The nylon sling could not take the resulting overload and the sling sheared in two. The load never left the floor, no person was injured. I thought it was a failure of a load bearing lifting device or hoist. My boss says anything below the hook including spreaders or sling is not the lifting device, but is part of the load. This is not point scoring against my boss I just want to know for my own future knowledge.

Posted By Stuart Nagle Hi, Jane. Well this is not so difficult... The sling, well yes it is lifting equipment, just the same a harness would be if a person were to wear it. Just because it not an intrinsic part of the lifting device does not exclude it. As such it is subject to supply with a certificate of conformity and test certificate stating its load ect... The fact that it broke signifies two things: 1) It was beyond it's design breaking strain, or 2) if it was not (?) it was not suitable/fit for purpose. Unfortunately, now it is destroyed this particular sling cannot be tested under strain to destruction. It may be worth considering carry out some tests on others, if you have any to spare, and incorporating a strain gauge to see if it fails before it reaches it load test weight (just an idea !!) The fact that someone had forgot to unbolt the equipment from the floor, and hence was trying to lift the entire construction brought tears to my eyes.... Sorry about that... but on a more serious note this says that your systems are inadequate or not being used !!! DANGER SIGNS HERE.... You should, I would have thought, had a risk assessment for this task, and as the consiquencies of dropping the load and the potetially serious injury likely, would have had a method statement for the task. This I would hasten to add should have included unbolting the equipment (freeing) to allow for the movement/lift. The fact that the shearing sling did not hurt anyone is lucky rather than not consequential - this I would believe is a 'near miss'incident and should be recorded as such if you have systems to deal with this. Reportable under RIDDOR... I don't think so, as no one was actually injured, and it did not involve the failure of the lifting device itself, rather a failure of the system of work...however it could have been very different. In reporting, you would be looking at lifting a known load, with a sling of a known maximum lift weight. If it then broke at a weight under the load it was supposed to bear it certainly would be reportable !! As stated above, we don't know what load was put on the sling...and the system was at fault, not the tackle...se la vie... Was the lifting device (apart from the sling) within test ? Is it mechanical/electrical/hydraulic/manual ??? (all of these things have to be considered.) I would suggest you: 1) review the risk assessment(s) 2) review the method statement(s) or if you do not have one, think about providing them 3) competent inspection of lifting tackle monthly and before use and testing as required (6 mothly for manriding 12 monthly for other) 4) Look at accident and near miss reporting regime 5) investigate levels of supervision and enhance as required. it could be that competent supervision (or the lack of it) was the cause here !!! Hope this helps... Stuart Nagle

Posted By STEVE HI JANE I THINK YOU SHOULD HEED STUARTS ADVICE,AND USE THIS NEAR-MISS AS A GOOD EXAMPLE OF THE NEED TO REPORT NEAR MISSES. I CANNOT BELIEVE THAT THIS EMPLOYEE HAS BEEN ABLE TO ACHIEVE THIS WITHOUT DOUBTING HIS COMPETANCE,EXPERIENCE AND TRAINING ON THE USE OF LIFTING EQUIPMENT+ACCESSORIES. CERTAINLY LEGISLATION APPEARS TO HAVE BEEN BROKEN,BUT MAYBE NOT WHERE YOUR HEADING BY LOOKING AT THE MACHINERY. 1=WAS EMPLOYEE TRAINED TO USE LIFTING HOIST? 2=WHO PUT THE SLING ON OBJECT TO BE MOVED? 3=WHAT WAS THE SWL{SAFE WORKING LOAD}FOR THE HOIST,WHAT WAS THE WEIGHT OF THE OBJECT,WHAT WAS THE SWL OF THE SLING. 4=WAS THE SLING TAGGED,TO SHOW LAST INSPECTION DATE? 5=HAVE WORKERS BEEN ON BASIC RIGGING COURSES? I BELIEVE THAT IF THE EMPLOYEE HAD BEEN GIVEN SUFFIECENT TRAINING IN RIGGING AND LIFTING EQUIPMENT THEN THIS WOULD HAVE NEVER HAPPENED,IF HE HAS THESE THEN THERE IS A BREAK DOWN IN SAFE PROCEDURES,COMMUNICATION,TIREDNESS ETC. IS IT LOLER REPORTABLE? IF LIFTING HOIST IS TAGGED WITH SWL,TAGGED TO SHOW IT HAS REGULAR INSPECTIONS,THE SAME WITH THE SLING AND YOU CAN SHOW THIS WITH DOCUMENTATION. THEN I PERSONALLY THINK NOT AND WOULD LOOK MORE INTO EMPLOYEES COMPETANCE ON LIFTING EQUIPMENT+ACCESSORIES. MAYBE THIS IS WHY YOUR EMPLOYER DOES NOT THINK IT IS REPORTABLE,AS THERE ARE REGS FOR TRAINING,INFORMATION AND SUPERVISION UNDER LOLER,AND WHO KNOWS WHATCOULD ALSO BE UNEARTHED IF A INSPECTION WAS DONE MAYBE I HAVE LOOKED INTO THIS TO MUCH BUT AS A EX-RIGGER I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS HAS HAPPENED THE WAY IT DID. P.S DEPENDANT ON HOW THE SLING WAS APPLYED TO THE OBJECT THE SLING CAN ALSO LOSE UP TO HALF ITS SWL{ANGLE OF THE BIGHT MUST NOT EXCEED 120 DEGREES} BUT IN TELLING THIS ANYTHING THATS STILL BOLTED DOWN IS GOING TO NEED TO BE MIGHTY STRONG,HENCE THE WEAK LINK BECOMES THE NLYON STROP=WHO PUT THE STROP ON=WHY PUT IT ON WHEN OBJECT IS STILL BOLTED DOWN=COMPETANCE,TRAINING AND EXPERIENCE. HOPE OF SOME USE,LET US KNOW IF YOU FIND THE ANSWER. STEVE.

Posted By Ken Taylor As a general point with regard to incident reporting, I have always tried to promote the view 'If in doubt do it' on the assumption that it's better to have reported something unnecessarily that not to have done so when one should!

Posted By Jane Smith Once again, thanks for all the replies, and yes the over-riding aspect to it all is that thankfully nobody was injured. At the end of the day no matter how or why we got into this health and safety careers we all want to keep people safe.