Fracture at work
James was only 20 when he fractured his ankle in an accident at work on a building site back in July 2004. His ankle became trapped when two bundles of steel bars fell from a JCB whilst being moved on site.
After surgery to fix the fracture James eventually returned to football only to sustain a further fracture to his ankle at the weak point created after the first fracture. Further surgery was needed to remove the metalwork in James’ ankle and James has had a total of 8 months off work and lost the opportunity to play semi-professional football as a result of the accident.
A claim was made by our specialist accident at work team on behalf of James for damages for the injuries and losses sustained as a result of the accident. The building site claim was settled out of court and James received £22,500 in compensation.
Lisa Fairclough, from Irwin Mitchell's accident at work team, said: "This case highlights the importance of contractors on site ensuring that proper arrangements are made to transport materials. The materials here needed to be moved and this was done on an adhoc basis without proper arrangements for banking of the load. James’ injuries were serious but could have been so much worse had he not managed to get himself at least partly out of the way of the falling load."