Injury claim news
02/08/2011

School fined after a teenager falls through loft

A Cambridgeshire school has been fined by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) after a teenager was left injured in a fall from height accident.

The 19-year-old girl was working as a pool attendant at the school when she was asked to collect paperwork from storage items kept in a loft. To carry out the task the teenager had to walk along a beam to get across the un-boarded flooring of the loft, but in doing so she lost her footing and fell through the loft floor and onto the tiled changing room floor below.

The teenager was fortunate enough to only suffer a fractured wrist from the fall.

A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation discovered that the school had failed to carry out an adequate risk assessment and had also failed to prevent employees from working on or near to fragile surfaces.

Following a successful prosecution at Huntingdon Magistrates' Court, the school admitted to a breach of the Work at Height Regulations and was fined £6,000.

It has not been reported whether the personal injury victim will be pursuing a fall from height compensation claim through the civil courts.