An engineering company has been fined $300,000 over the death of a worker and injuring of another at a former Victorian cheese processing factory.
Andrew Buchanan Engineering Ltd was sentenced without conviction in the Melbourne County Court on Thursday after earlier pleading guilty to two charges of failing to ensure that the workplace under its management and control was safe and without risks to health.
The company was overseeing the dismantling and packing of equipment at a decommissioned cheese factory for relocation to New Zealand in December 2017.
However, there was no company representative on site when a condenser weighing 770kg was moved into a closed-top shipping container with a crane.
Two workers inside the container were preparing to remove skates from underneath the condenser when it fell off a jack, killing a 59-year-old man and seriously injuring his co-worker.
A WorkSafe investigation found that there were reasonably practicable measures available to reduce or eliminate risk associated with the task and the company also failed to ensure workers were appropriately supervised.
