A factory worker who injured two metatarsals in his left foot after he was provided with the wrong equipment to move alloy bars is to receive £6,500 compensation for fracturing a foot at work.
Michael Kirby (47) from Sheffield, South Yorkshire, sustained his injury while working as a machine operator for local company Ross & Catherall Limited. Michael had been moving some five feet long alloy bars with a scissor clamp, as he had been trained to do, when one of the bars fell from the clamp and landed on his foot.
Despite wearing steel toe-capped boots with a metatarsal guard, the impact of the alloy bar was so heavy that it fractured two bones in his foot. Michael was taken to hospital immediately, where his foot was fitted with an aircast boot and he was provided with crutches in order that he could still be mobile.
Following his accident, Michael´s employers changed their working practises so that the metal bars were placed closer to the vacuum machine into which Michael had been trying to move them, and a different type of clamp with curved interlocking forks was introduced to improve safety.
After seeking legal advice from his union, Michael made an injury claim for fracturing a foot at work on the grounds that he had been trained to move the alloy bars in an unsafe way, and that no risk assessment had been conducted until after his accident had occurred.
His employers – Ross & Catherall Limited – admitted liability for Michael´s foot injury and settled his claim for compensation for fracturing a foot a work out of court for £6,500.