A Manchester-based grab hire firm, Salford Grab Hire Limited, has been fined £10,000 plus £3,475.90 costs after a one-tonne excavator bucket, used to prop a raised tipper truck body during repair, became dislodged and crushed a mechanic in October 2023. The worker sustained multiple fractures to his hand, shoulder blade, ribs, shin and thigh, a crushed ankle and foot, and a pulmonary blood clot. HSE found the bucket lacked a quick hitch or retaining pin and that no appropriate tipper body support equipment or safe system of work had been used.

A 21,000 m² reactivated landslide threatening the settlement of Köprülü in northeastern Turkey forced engineers to combine InSAR, GNSS, inclinometers, piezometers and detailed geomorphological mapping to understand rapidly accelerating ground deformation and building cracking. The team distinguished an active deep-seated slide from adjacent dormant and secondary movements, using displacement rates and groundwater data to refine the failure surface geometry and kinematics. This combined analysis directly informed whether to pursue large-scale stabilisation works or managed relocation, illustrating how multi-sensor monitoring can de-risk high-consequence decisions on inhabited slopes.

A self-employed contractor has been jailed for 12 months after 19-year-old labourer Thomas Neate died from head injuries sustained when he fell through an opening while stripping tiles from a domestic garage roof in Staines-upon-Thames on 16 August 2023. HSE investigators found the demolition was carried out directly from the roof with no scaffolding, decking or fall-prevention system, alongside unsafe mini-digger use and unrestricted public access to the site. Asbestos cement sheets were also broken up and removed by hand with no prior survey, exposing three other workers and the household to fibre risk.