Federal OSHA recorded a severe workplace injury
at GFS Transport East, LLC, 364 Maine Mall Rd. , SOUTH PORTLAND, MAINE 04106
on — Fractures, affecting the hip(s).
Final narrative
An employee was delivering product to a customer when the employee slipped and fell on ice, breaking the right hip.
An employee was working in the forest flagging an area to be harvested. He took a step and his foot slipped on a stick hidden under the leaves, causing him to fall to the ground. He landed on his right foot/lower leg resulting in a fractured tibia.
An employee was inspecting an apartment to ensure it was ready for a new resident to move in. The carpet in the apartment had been recently cleaned and was still wet. As the employee went from the carpet to the tiled floor of the bathroom, they slipped and fell, resulting in a torn left hamstring.
An employee was delivering a letter along a rural carrier route when she stepped on an ice-covered snow drift, slipped, and fell to the ground. The employee sustained a right hip fracture that required surgery.
More severe injuries in this industry (NAICS 484121)
An employee fell while exiting a trailer. The employee landed on their left side on the pavement, suffering multiple broken ribs on the left side. The employee was hospitalized.
An employee was hooking up a set of 28-foot trailers, attaching a converter dolly to the lead trailer's pintle hook. He backed up the lead trailer and parked it a foot from the converter dolly, then lifted the converter dolly and rolled it to the lead trailer to set it onto the hook. The converter dolly kicked up, and the employee's left hand was caught between it and the trailer. He suffered a severe laceration to the palm between the ring finger and middle finger.
An employee was cleaning the windshield of his truck. When he stepped down from the truck, he lost balance and reached to catch himself using the side mirror. The impact fractured his left wrist. The employee was hospitalized and required surgery.
An employee was standing on the DOT bumper on the back of a standard 53-foot trailer. The employee lost his footing and his grip on the handle bar, and fell approximately 42 inches to the ground. The employee was hospitalized with a fractured left hip/femur.
A driver was making a delivery. As he was climbing onto his trailer to get boxes, the strap he was using to pull himself up broke. He fell from the back of the trailer to the ground, landing on his right leg and breaking his femur.
A crew was installing drilled micropiles alongside an outdoor covered deck foundation. The injured employee was working the front of the drill when a loose section of casing dropped onto the tip of a rig wrench and pulled the wrench down to an embedded casing. The employee's left little finger was caught between the rig wrench and the embedded casing and was amputated above the top knuckle.
Two employees were working to change a tire on a mobile slasher saw. The slasher weighs around 2,000 pounds and is towed. Employee 2 was lifting the saw while the injured employee was placing a block of wood under the frame for support. The slasher then lowered onto the block and the injured employee's left thumb was crushed between the slasher frame and the wood block, leading to an amputation at the first knuckle.
An employee was using a crane to move a 44-foot, 3,343-pound I-beam. As the beam was moving west, it straightened out (north to south), beginning to swing south toward the northwest corner of a building. The crane then sent the beam southward, directly toward the corner of the building. The beam caught the tips of the employee's left index, middle, and ring fingers against the building. The last joints of the middle and ring fingers were amputated, and the last joint of the index finger was partially crushed.
An employee was standing on a step stool, removing the nuts and bolts from the frame of a solar panel that was being replaced. The employee's cheek made contact with a connector with damaged insulation. The employee was shocked, briefly lost consciousness, and fell to the ground, suffering an injury to the left shoulder.