Cherry picker sticking out onto the road, hit by bus

[Bolt]

21 hours ago, kram said:

Nothing about the bus driver or bus company?!? The driver should be bannned and a big fine for them too.

Anyone who reckons that you can work on or at the side of the road, and rely on all the road users to make the correct decisions around them is wildly naive.

[difflock]

I would kinda say 50/50 liability.

The MEWP should not have been used there(without lane or road closure!)

BUT

The "professional" bus driver, being held to higher standards SHOULD have seen it.

Except I suppose the law looks at the fact that the collision could not have happened if the MEWP had not been there. Simples.

[woody paul]

22 hours ago, kram said:

Nothing about the bus driver or bus company?!? The driver should be bannned and a big fine for them too.

If that picture relates to accident, there's no cones or signs, if there was machine should be kept in that zone. 

If operator had the correct training it shouldn't of happened, if he was trained he should be fined as well. 

[kram]

5 hours ago, Bolt said:

Anyone who reckons that you can work on or at the side of the road, and rely on all the road users to make the correct decisions around them is wildly naive.

Even so, when road users do not make correct decisions, should they not be held to account?

Are cones and signs more visible than a brightly coloured MEWP arm?

 

If cones and signs were used, they would have to be put in the correct place accounting for the large overhang of the MEWPs knuckle which may not be obvious before its in position. You'd need a groundie to brave traffic and shuffle cones around all day, and risk being hit by a bus, dont worry though he can wear a cone on his head.

 

Odd choice of MEWP? The ones we have used, did not have a knuckle sticking out the back so there was no overhang opposite the direction of the arm.

 

 

 

[Canal Navvy]

It was reasonably foreseeable, RAMS should have made virtually impossible. 

The bus driver was only a relatively minor link in the chain and could only ever have been slightly culpable. 

 

[Doug Tait]

45 minutes ago, kram said:

Even so, when road users do not make correct decisions, should they not be held to account?

Are cones and signs more visible than a brightly coloured MEWP arm?

 

If cones and signs were used, they would have to be put in the correct place accounting for the large overhang of the MEWPs knuckle which may not be obvious before its in position. You'd need a groundie to brave traffic and shuffle cones around all day, and risk being hit by a bus, dont worry though he can wear a cone on his head.

 

Odd choice of MEWP? The ones we have used, did not have a knuckle sticking out the back so there was no overhang opposite the direction of the arm.

 

 

 

 

Cones and signs primary purpose is not to be more visible than working equipment, it's to "manage" vehicles and pedestrians safely around the work site.

 

Also it's perfectly viable to set up lights, cones and signs in advance taking into account the parameters of work as concluded by RAMS, it happens on a daily basis.

 

The long and short of it is if you're going to set up on a public road to do work for profit then it's on you to control your worksite safely.

Edited October 26 by Doug Tait
Navvy beat me to it!

[Dan Maynard]

I'm thinking it's a bus route, it'll be busy.

 

I feel as if we are supposed to use Mewps because they're safer, but I also feel that as more and more people use mewps the operation standards will drop and they will get less safe.

[Steven P]

I haven't read this story fully but for the bus driver I'd assume the action would be the same as if they hit any parked car - it happens - civil action through the insurers unless the driver had been driving dangerously (not sure if all bus accidents need reporting to the police). For height, all bridges have a height marker, the bus driver should know the height of the bus so hitting a bridge is dangerous? No height marker on the MEWP and it is in a massive blind spot - above head height out of sight or mirrors.... so bus driver... insurance claim level perhaps.

 

For the MEWP operator it wold be pretty obvious even to me (never having driven one) that you'd consider passing traffic in a risk assessment and that working at height should require the use of a harness (in my line of work, generally above head height, I know climbers are different). So either the risk assessments had failed to spot 2 fairly major things, the operatives didn't get a sight of the risk assessments (RA done, saved, filed away, safe), or the site supervision was lacking to allow both things to happen and from what it sounds the worker didn't have a harness to start with. I think that is what the fine is for - the failing in the system to allow the MEWP to be in a position to be hit and no PPE with perhaps no or poor risk assessment.

 

As for the road - it is a road skirting a housing scheme (estate), 30 limit but.... with narrowed sections and speed bumps, Glasgow council road which means pot holed to buggery as well. It can be like a giant slalom avoiding everything and perhaps the bus was nearer the kerb than usual to avoid other cars? Note also that the houses / flats side of the road had 'layby' parking that the MEWP was parked in not the main carriageway, you might not expect it to jut out into the road either. Not sure though.... but got to keep awake on that road. (As an aside, to the right is a park with the commonwealth games MTB course, a decent beech woodland (1m diameter trees generally), and loads of tracks to get away from it all, the estate used to be known as "little Beirut" a while back...)

 

 

 

EDIT....

As a learning point we all know, if you are working on the side of the road, expect drivers to be idiots (not all) and take precautions to mitigate them.

 

(Idiots... my road every now and then gets shut for works... and the number of drivers you see move the cones, ignore the signs and have to do a U turn is amazing for a quieter road, mitigate for these drivers)

Edited October 26 by Steven P