Forklift knocked spooler bar onto person's leg

While helping with spooling operations at a third-party yard, a person was injured in the lower leg, when a forklift truck struck the edge of a spooler bar causing it to roll onto his legs, resulting in soft tissue damage. The injured person was working on a spooling winch, with the spooler bar positioned behind him, resting on wooden chocks. The forklift truck reversed from the rear of the spooling winch and struck the edge of the spooler bar, resulting in it rolling from the wooden chocks onto the persons’ leg. He was unable to work for four days.

• What was expected to happen?

- It was planned that spooler bar would be inserted into the reel;

• What actually happened?

- The wrong size of spooler bar was provided by a sub-contractor, and this led to the spooler bar being placed in an unsafe position in the working area of the person who was injured;

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