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Colonial Mechanical Corporation, Issue No. 3
| June
2002
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The Contractors Critic
Colonial Mechanical
A FIRST ENERGY COMPANY
Reporting on Safety, Productivity, and Honesty in the Construction Industry.
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mORE Accidents &
SAFetY VIOLATIONS
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ANOTHER COLONIAL WORKER ALMOST KILLED IN
VAN ACCIDENT AND THEN FIRED
Hampton Edward Forbes, a Colonial Mechanical
employee, was driving home at the end of his shift on a Colonial project at
Valleydale Foods. As he drove along in the Colonial Mechanical van, it began to
drizzle. Then a deer bounded in front of him. He stood on the brakes, but the
brakes failed because of the heavy load of Colonial equipment on board,
according to his written account. "The van swerved to the right, and I took out
100 feet of embankment, two boulders, and hit an tree," said Forbes, before the
van crashed and exploded into flames.
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The damaged Colonial Mechanical van after Forbes’s horrific accident.
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Forbes made it out before the explosion, and a passerby took him to the
hospital. After the doctors cleaned the glass and sand out of the wound on his
forehead, he received 40 stitches to close the gash. He also suffered a
dislocated hip and a lacerated knee.
Colonial Mechanical did not seem grateful that he escaped with his life, or
chagrined that the van that was overweight with the equipment, including 600
feet of rigid pipe, tools and hardware that may have contributed to the fiery
crash. Just one week later, they fired Hampton Forbes. When he complained to his
supervisor, "He wouldn’t give me a straight answer," Forbes said. He asked, "I
guess I am a liability?" His supervisor replied yes.
Currently Forbes is in battle with Colonial Mechanical over
his Workers Compensation claim, and he has hired an attorney for that fight.
It is not surprising that Colonial Mechanical Corporation is
fighting Forbes’ workers Compensation claim. With 70 to 100 workers injured
every year, Colonial Mechanical Corporation has a lot of experience with Workers
Compensation claims. The Critic was able to find numerous additional cases of
Colonial Mechanical Corporation battling over injured Workers Compensation
claims. Here are some examples.
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This Colonial Mechanical Company truck was
totaled by a drunken Colonial employee after he left the company sponsored
picnic |
Richard Barker was a pipefitter for Colonial Mechanical
Corporation, who suffered a severe head injury and was awarded temporary total
disability benefits. Colonial Mechanical Corporation sought an administrative
appeals hearing to force a reduction in Barker’s benefits. To prove their case,
Colonial Mechanical Corporation had a private investigator let the air out of
the investigator’s car tires near Barker’s house. Then the investigator went to
Barker and asked for a tow. When Barker finished helping the investigator, the
PI forced $40 into Barker’s hands. Then Colonial Mechanical Corporation went to
the Workers Compensation appeals board, claiming that Barker was making money on
the side as a tow truck operator, and his benefits should be reduced.
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COLONIAL WORKER SEVERELY INJURED IN A FALL AT THE NORFOLK
INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT EXPANSION
| In May 2001, a Colonial Mechanical Corporation
employee was working on the outer edge of a guardrail system, but he was not
wearing his fall arrest system. Abruptly, he tumbled 15 feet to the floor below,
and suffered traumatic bodily injury. Virginia OSHA issued a serious violation,
and proposed a $5,000 fine against Colonial Mechanical Corporation. During
February 2000, Virginia OSHA inspected the Colonial Mechanical Corporation job
site at the VCU Life Sciences Center on Cary Street in Richmond, Virginia. The
OSHA inspectors found that the ladder way roof opening was not provided with a
gate or other protection, meaning any of the 30 Colonial Mechanical Corporation
workers on that job could fall through the opening, and plummet 13 feet to a
concrete floor. Broken bones or a concussion were likely injuries. The Colonial
Mechanical Corporation safety inspector on the job admitted they should have
recognized that the opening did not meet OSHA standards.
OSHA proposed a $2,625 fine against Colonial Mechanical Corporation, and
levied a serious citation. OSHA also evaluated the Colonial Mechanical
Corporation safety program, and rated it only as "average." OSHA did not cite
Colonial Mechanical Corporation for a "repeated" violation, although just eight
months earlier, Colonial Mechanical Corporation received a similar serious
citation for an identical problem.
The earlier citation was issued against Colonial Mechanical Corporation in
June 1999, at the Capitol One job in Spotsylvania, for failing to install an
adequate guardrail system to protect their employees from fall dangers from the
open sides of stair platforms that rose four stories above the ground. In this
instance, OSHA proposed another serious violation against Colonial Mechanical
Corporation and proposed a $1,625 fine.
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Colonial Mechanical falls
from the list of top fifty employers in the Richmond-Petersburg area.
Details in the next issue. |
There were many problems on this job. OSHA noted that "the footing was very
uneven, and there was a good deal of construction debris, posing a tripping
hazard. The stairwell ... was without adequate lighting ... openings in the
floors were not properly barricaded ... gasoline engines were running inside of
the building ... oxygen and acetylene bottles were unsecured, posing an extreme
danger."
At this job site, OSHA rated Colonial Mechanical Corporation’s safety
programs only as "adequate," and their Health Training Program as
"non-existent."
Just two months earlier, Virginia OSHA found more serious violations at a
Colonial Mechanical Corporation job site at the Collegiate School in Richmond.
This time, Colonial Mechanical Corporation had Colonial Mechanical committed
serious violations of the OSHA trenching rules, and exposed Colonial Mechanical
Corporation workers to cave-in hazards. OSHA discovered that Colonial Mechanical
Corporation employees were installing pipe and plywood in two seven foot deep
trenches without cave-in protections.
The foreman said it had been raining heavily and he thought the trench may
cave in, and he knew the people would have to be in the trenches to check on the
pipe installation. OSHA noted there was 8 inches of water in one of the
trenches. Adding to the stress on the soils, a trailer was parked four feet away
and truck loading was going on just 10 feet away.
Nonetheless, the Colonial Mechanical Corporation foreman insisted the soil
types were safe. OSHA disagreed and assessed a $1,875 fine for a serious
violation.
OSHA again rated Colonial Mechanical Corporation’s safety programs at this
job site only as "adequate" and their Health Training Program as "non-existent." | | | | | | |
