Worker Crushed by Timber, Company Fined £2.2M

0:00On March 31, a building supplies company just got slapped with a $2,200,000-pound fine after a worker got crushed to death by a three-ton pallet of timber. It happened at their sawmill site in Suffolk on the 22nd of May, 2024. 56-year-old Paul Coulson climbed into a conveyor to unwrap packaging, but a coworker fired it up without spotting him, sending the load right into him. The company, Hughes Gray Limited, runs sites all over Great Britain, and new workers kept entering that danger zone. They even put up signs. But CCTV caught 19 violations in the month leading up to the tragedy. Health and safety executive investigators found the firm dragged its speed on fixes despite spotting the issue early. Now they've added guards, changed how pallets get unwrapped, and boosted CCTV coverage. This preventable loss hits hard, underscoring how ignoring risks, costs lives, robust steps from the start could have kept Coulson breathing today.