Lift firm fined £200k over engineer's death at Muller's Shropshire plant

Lewis McFarlin suffered multiple injuries, his inquest heard

A lift maintenance firm has been fined £200,000 after an employee died when he became trapped above a moving lift at dairy giant Muller's headquarters.

Lewis McFarlin, 24, from Stoke-on-Trent, was confirmed dead at the Shropshire plant in January 2020.

The lift unexpectedly started moving while he was working on it but his death was preventable, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) said.

Lift Monitoring Systems Limited admitted failing to discharge its duty.

It was also ordered to pay costs of £45,000 at the hearing at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court on Monday.

The company, formerly known as RJ Lift Services Limited, of Oldfield Business Park, Stoke-on-Trent, pleaded guilty to the charge brought under the Health and Safety at Work Act.

The 24-year-old and two other engineers were at the Market Drayton site to work on a different lift before being asked to resolve an issue with a door-opening mechanism on a lift-landing door, the HSE said.

'Tragic and preventable'

Mr McFarlin was on top of a lift car and the lift put into inspection mode so he could control it while the work was done.

The lift began moving at normal speed after switching out of inspection mode, the HSE said

But it suddenly switched to normal mode and began moving at normal speed, trapping him in a void between the lift car and the structural elements of the lift shaft, the HSE said.

Although colleagues tried to release him, he suffered multiple injuries and had died by the time the emergency services arrived.

The jury at an inquest into his death in 2021 recorded a conclusion of accidental death.

The HSE investigation found there was a failure to cover the void in which Mr McFarlin became trapped and, if it had been covered over, the incident could not have happened.

Mr McFarlin's mother Leah Salt said: "Hearing all the evidence this last week has been extremely difficult. Hearing how Lewis' death was easily and reasonably preventable, is heart-breaking.

"No one should go to work and not return."

HSE inspector Andrew Johnson said it was "a tragic and entirely preventable incident" and the firm failed to meet its responsibilities.