Paper firm fined after worker severs fingers

David Millband of Chapel-en-le-Frith also partially severed his thumb when his right hand was caught in a reel fed machine at the Bowden Lane plant. The incident had been "completely preventable" according to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The HSE told Buxton Magistrates that Millband had been carrying out a visual check of the reel-fed machine when he noticed that the paper had come loose. When he opened the door of the machine, it kept running and his fingers became caught. The doors to the machine had interlocks for safety, but these had been overridden. HSE inspector Fiona Coffey said: "The company had a legal duty to prevent access to the dangerous parts of their machinery, but provided engineers with keys which could override the interlocks. There had been a similar incident five months earlier which had resulted in lesser injuries but, while the company had purchased a new system for the interlocks, they had not made this operational by the time of the second incident." The Crimped Paper Works Limited, pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 11(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998.