death of a geological surveyor on friday

[gwyl]

Your employer's Health and Safety Policy should have a clause that says something like :' no staff shall work in deep excavations alone', and Confined Space training tickets are getting more common for us these days- the guidance says you must have at least a top man/woman at the top of a trench to keep an eye on you.

Having said all that- of course there is no way anyone should be getting in trenches that are more than c1.2m deep without them being shored. Or shallower trenches of the sides are loose, made of rubble, in wet conditions etc etc.

that said, one of our chaps - the H&S man, indeed - was in a trench 300mm deep last january; lost his balance, fell, bust his knee, still going to hospital for physio. the moral being that it can happen to us all, and that one must be aware the whole time on site. and even then...