SINGAPORE: A company that provides landscaping services was fined S$190,000 on Tuesday (Sep 24) after one its employees died while carrying out tree cutting work, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) said in a press release on Wednesday.
Sin Eng Cleaning Services (Sin Eng) had been hired to cut six trees over a few weeks in early August 2015. The trees were in vacant state land behind 62 Kheam Hock Road.
AdvertisementAdvertisementOn Aug 27, 2015, Sin Eng employee Chinniah Ganeshan was assigned along with two other workers to cut a section of one of these trees.
The Indian national was using a chainsaw to cut a part of the tree when the sawn-off section fell and hit him.
He fell from the tree, but remained suspended in mid-air by his harness and lanyard about 23m above the ground.
He was eventually brought down by a worker from another landscaping contractor nearby, but died from chest and neck injuries on site nearly two hours later, according to MOM.
AdvertisementAdvertisementSubsequent investigations found Sin Eng had failed to conduct an adequate risk assessment and to establish safe procedures.
"Investigations revealed that Sin Eng originally planned for the deceased to use a lorry crane mounted with a bucket to perform the assigned task," said MOM. "As there was a structure blocking the crane’s access, Sin Eng instructed the deceased to use the manual tree access method instead."
However risks related to the use of this method - such as the failure of tree access equipment and breaking of tree branches - were not identified or mitigated, said the ministry.
Workers were instead left to decide how to complete the task on their own.
"The deceased was the only certified tree climber in Sin Eng," added MOM. "When the incident happened, there was no other competent tree climber who could come to his help."
Sin Eng "severely compromised" the safety of its workers by failing to identify and address relevant risks, said MOM's director of occupational safety and health inspectorate Sebastian Tan.
"This process of risk management was especially critical given that there was a change in work method," he said. "The accident could have been prevented if the employer had reviewed their risk assessment, implemented control measures for the new work method and communicated these measures to its workers."
Members of Parliament have called for better treatment of injured migrant workers, as Parliament passed the amended Work Injury Compensation Act earlier this month.
[h=3]READ: MPs call for better treatment of injured migrant workers as amended work injury law passed[/h]Forty-one people died in 2018 after suffering injuries in the workplace.
The overall number of workplace injuries rose from 12,498 cases in 2017 to 12,810 cases in 2018, an increase of about 2.5 per cent.
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