A deadly fuel tank explosion has led to a home detention sentence for a South Auckland business owner.
Salter’s Cartage director Ronald Salter was given four-and-a-half months’ home detention and was jointly fined with his company more than $380,000 in the Manukau District Court on Tuesday.
Salter was also personally fined $25,000.
It comes after 24-year-old Jamey Bowring, who was contracting at the oil recycling company’s Wiri site on September 15, 2015, was killed in the explosion.
Salter’s Cartage, which has been in business since 1980, has a large fleet of trucks that specialise in oil recycling.
The contractor who employed Bowring, Race Works Limited, was convicted and discharged without penalty.
Bowring was undertaking ‘hot work’ involving welding and grinding on top of a 96,000-litre capacity tank which was close to empty. It contained a mixture of petrol, diesel and kerosene.
The tank blast threw Bowring 130 metres into a nearby car yard, killing him.
WorkSafe chief inspector investigations Keith Stewart says the “violations of health and safety requirements in this case were numerous and serious”.
“These failings led to a young man in the prime of his life dying.
“There is a family without a son and brother, a company without a workmate, a community without a valued member. We must always understand that the impact of a fatality is not just a statistic, but a real person.
“Mr Salter’s disregard for safety led directly to the death of a young man with his future in front of him.
“Mr Salter held himself out to WorkSafe in emails and other communications as the ‘conscience’ of the industry while at the same time failing to meet his own responsibilities.
“It is to avoid such a tragedy that we have health and safety legislation and rules for dealing with hot work and flammable vapours.
“I hope that every participant in this industry takes time today to ensure they’re absolutely on top of their health and safety responsibilities and we never have to see such a tragedy again,” Stewart says.
During sentencing Judge Richard McIlraith said investigators had uncovered “numerous failings” by the company in health and safety laws, Stuff reported.
A lack of documented arrangement between Salters Cartage and Race Works Limited and failing to undertake a site induction were among such errors.
