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Payout millions for brain injured worker
Christopher Kaye, aged 55, was changing a huge grabbing attachment, called a grapple, on an excavator when the metal fixing bar sprang out and hit him in the face.
He was rushed to the Northern General Hospital where he had life-saving surgery. He suffered severe brain damage and remained in the Keresforth neuro-rehabilitation unit for months after the accident in October 2008.
Mr Kaye, of Haigh, Barnsley, now needs round-the-clock care and cannot walk or care for himself without assistance. He struggles to talk and will not be able to work again.
Euro Dismantling Services, of Loxley Road, Loxley, Sheffield, accepted responsibility for the accident, which happened on the Omnivale site, on Newhall Road, Attercliffe, and provided an interim payment of 500,000.
Jill Greenfield, of personal injury lawyers Field Fisher Waterhouse, handling Mr Kaye's claim, said the full value was thought to be several millions.
The law firm gathered evidence that Mr Kaye had received inadequate training on how to change the grapple, that recommendations employees should receive more training were ignored, and that equipment that could have allowed him to do the job more safely was bought after the accident.
Ms Greenfield claimed written instructions on changing the grapple were not provided until after Mr Kaye's accident.
The firm denied this and initially disputed the claim. It later accepted primary responsibility and made the interim payment, maintaining Mr Kaye was partially to blame.
Ms Greenfield said this was not accepted by Mr Kaye's family but the parties came to an agreement whereby he would receive 90 per cent of his full damages rather than go to trial.
"This was a terrible accident that could have been avoided had better equipment and training been in place at Mr Kaye's workplace. It has been a difficult fight to secure financial support and, whilst money in itself cannot compensate for what my client and his family have gone through, it will ensure he is able to get the long term treatment and care he needs which is now absolutely essential to him."
The firm was unavailable for comment.
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