Pin removal a ‘two-man job,’ trial told
Emerson Klatt was working on the Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital when a table cart collapsed on 21-year-old Eric Ndayishimiye, who had been stripping nails on a cleaning crew moments before he was killed.
Klatt said another co-worker had removed two pins from the Pilosio cart, which allowed the equipment to pivot more freely into tight spaces, before it fell on July 21, 2016.
Although workers often removed the pins from the cart — similar to a scaffold on wheels used to hold tables — it was always a “two-man job,” Klatt testified at the trial for the men’s employer, Alberta-based subcontractor Banff Constructors Ltd., and the cart supplier, Pilosio Canada Inc.
Both companies are charged under the Occupational Health and Safety Act, accused of being liable in Ndayishimiye’s death by failing to provide proper training, failing to arrange for the safe use of trolleys and, in Pilosio’s case, failing to ensure the safety of supplied equipment when used as instructed.
Klatt said he did not see the accident because he was pouring concrete on another floor, but his co-worker, Gerard Mclaren, told him he had been using the cart alone when one of the wheels hit a rock and caused the cart to topple.
Ndayishimiye died from multiple blunt force injuries to his chest, neck and head, according to an agreed statement of facts.
Court heard Mclaren returned to Ireland after the incident and refused to testify at this week’s Saskatoon provincial court trial.
The Crown is attempting to enter statements Mclaren made to others as hearsay evidence through a voir dire, or admissibility hearing.
Klatt told prosecutor Buffy Rodgers that he received no formal training on how to use or assemble the cart. He told Pilosio’s lawyer, Jonathan Frustaglio, that he never received training from either Graham Construction, the prime contractor, or Pilosio, and was not aware Pilosio offered training on how to use the cart.
Pilosio had supplied the cart to Graham Construction, not Banff Constructors, and had sent a representative to train Graham on how to use the cart at an Alberta hospital, Frustaglio told Klatt.
During questioning by Banff’s lawyer, David Myrol, Klatt said the cart wouldn’t have fallen over if two people had been using it. However, he told Frustaglio that he can’t recall if Banff instructed workers to ensure two people were using the cart at all times.
He said the cart was difficult to use alone; the busy job site was filled with obstacles and the steel castors “had a mind of its own.”
Klatt testified that his crew realized two pins were missing as they assembled the Pilosio cart, so they made pins out of threaded coil rod.
The effectiveness of the homemade pins wasn’t at issue because Mclaren had removed them before the cart fell, Klatt said on cross-examination.
Myrol pointed to field inspection documents that outlined the levels of job site hazards and how to control them.
Klatt said he performed the inspections every day, and that he considered both himself and his supervisors competent enough to operate the Pilosio carts.
The voir dire will continue next week.