TV-9, KCRG reporter Jami Brinton has a very interesting news report about the death of the worker who fell and died while refitting windows last month. The worker, Thomas Fosdick, fell 40-feet while working on the exterior of the Boyd Law Building. The co-worker, Mikel O’Haver describes Fosdick losing his balance and causing the ladder to teeter. O’Haver indicates feeling uneasy about Fosdick not being tied off with a fall-arrest safety harness.

Notice the safety equipment is named “fall-arrest” or “fall-protection”, not fall prevention. That’s  because falls are inevitable with working at heights. The idea is to limit the falls and to arrest the worker who does fall.

Read reporter Brinton’s article, here is a quote from the investigative report.

In a written statement, O’Haver said he was working on the roof of the law school assisting Fosdick saw a glass frame.

“I was keeping a eye on him [Fosdick] because I had a bad feeling he wasn’t tied off,” O’Haver wrote.

O’Haver said when Fosdick finished what he was cutting, “he lost his balance…and fell to the right making the ladder lean to the right.”

“It teetered right then back,” O’Haver wrote. “Tommy fell backwards hitting the ladder twisting Tommy around.”

O’Haver said when Fosdick started to fall he “grabbed his belt buckle trying to straighten him out in the process,” but had to let Fosdick go.

“I lost feeling in my arm and had to let go so I didn’t fall off the roof,” he wrote. “He [Fosdick] loosened his grip in the process.”

Remember, it's fall-arrest gear. The assumption is, sooner or later you will fall. Like falling in love, sooner or later everyone does it. So all you construction workers need to understand that on this planet, with gravity, falls do happen and no worker can avoid the consequences when it does occur.

See also Worker at Iowa's law school falls and dies: Fall Protection?