New Zealand forestry company to pay over $500k after fatal workplace incident

A New Zealand forestry company has been fined a total of $536,000 following a fatal workplace incident near Wairoa two years ago.

The man was repairing a harvester head when he was crushed in November 2020.

The company was recently sentenced at the Auckland District Court after pleading guilty to health and safety breaches following the incident.

WorkSafe’s area investigation manager, Danielle Henry said “Although the field technicians were provided with some safety instruction, the manuals for the harvester head were large and the 'buddy' training system the business had was insufficient. There was no other supervision and monitoring of the field technicians’ safety knowledge and practices.”

Read the full story on the WorkSafe NZ website.