Garden Maintenance Company fined for refuelling fireball
A Darwin based garden maintenance company was fined $10,000 on 4 December in the Darwin Local Court after a refuelling incident injured one of its workers.
In October 2022, two employees of Tiger Contracting NT Pty Ltd (trading as Tiger Trees NT) were refuelling a work vehicle using a jerry can. One employee held the jerry can, while the other held a funnel in the vehicle.
A third employee approached, placing a cigarette in the mouth of the employee holding the funnel and attempted to light the cigarette with a lighter. A fireball erupted burning the employee holding the funnel and engulfing the vehicle.
Tiger Trees NT pleaded guilty to one charge under Section 33 of the Act for breaching its primary duty of care under Section 19(3)(a)(c)(d) and (f), for failing to ensure:
- a work environment without risks to health and safety
- a safe system of work
- the safe use of plant
- the provision of supervision.
The Northern Territory’s Work Health and Safety Regulator, Mr Grant Hastie said this incident was a reminder for employers to ensure that appropriate work health and safety policies and procedures were in place, and the policies and procedures were followed.
“Our investigations determined that Tiger Trees NT did not have specific policies or procedures for the safe handling and use of flammable substances including fuel,” Mr Hastie said.
“However, they did have a policy not to re-fuel vehicles with jerry cans at the workplace, as well as a no smoking policy on the premises, including near fuel.”
“If these policies were followed, the incident would not have occurred.”
“A key document in developing these policies and procedures is the safety data sheet for petrol, which includes the information that petrol generates a lot of flammable vapour at ambient temperatures that can be easily ignited causing a fireball as happened here.”
“Important hazard prevention information in the safety data sheet is to keep fuel away from heat, hot surfaces, sparks, open flames and other ignition sources, and no smoking.”
Tiger Trees NT was also required to pay NT WorkSafe’s legal costs of $13,750.
The Section 32 charge against Tiger Trees NT, and the Section 32 charge against the worker who attempted to light the cigarette where both withdrawn by consent.