FLOORING company Getts has pleased guilty and was fined $4000 for failing to provide edge protection on a building site, after a sub-contractor fell 2.4m.

The incident occurred in July 2007 at a private residence under construction in Rockingham. Generation Homes (WA) had engaged Getts to lay a wooden floor on the second storey of the house.

A sub-contractor went to the second storey via an internal stairwell that had no edge protection at the top. While he was laying the wooden flooring near the edge of the stairwell, he fell from the edge to the ground floor below.

The fall cracked the worker’s pelvis and fractured a vertebra.

According to WorkSafe WA, the fall could have been prevented with barriers and fall arrest systems. Falls are said to be one of the most significant causes of workplace death in the construction industry, and ten Western Australian workers have died in less than three years as a result of falls. A further 1295 are injured each year.