Accidents.co.za | Discussion, Prevention, Investigation and Response

A rescue lasting more than 2 and half hours played off in the Alberton area Wednesday morning at 08h00. A worker at a cement company got his hand stuck in a machine about 10 meters above ground level. Exact details of why the man stuck his hand into the machine will remain a subject for investigation.

Firemen arrived with the Hydraulic platform and their high angle rescue team within minutes of receiving the call.

Quickly two men were hoisted up to the patient and a rescue stared in earnest. After all attempts were made to free the man from the machine they had to resort to using an angle girder to cut away some of the metal around the man’s hand.

This was a very delicate operation and the metal had to be cooled at regular intervals to prevent the patient from being burnt. Once the worker was freed, it was ascertained that he had sustained serious lacerations to all the fingers. Firemen then lowered him to the ground where a ambulance was standing by to transport him to the Netcare Union hospital for the treatment that he required.

The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said on Thursday more than 5000 mineworkers have downed tools at the Northam Platinum Mine in Rustenburg to mourn the deaths of the two mineworkers killed there last week.

The union said its members will gather at the mine for a memorial service and then disperse.

The two miners were killed in a ground fall accident last Tuesday.

NUM’s Lesiba Seshoka said by holding a day of mourning it is sending a strong message to mine bosses.

“Now that we have seen that you always put production over the lives of ordinary people [it tells us production is] more important. Therefore if you don’t treat this seriously we will take the day off so that you will also feel the pain in terms of production,” he said.

(Story by Tara Meaney,Edited by Deshnee Subramany appeared on Eyewitness News)

Paramedics from several emergency response teams have rushed to Addington Beach Durban where it appeared that a small aircraft made an emergency landing.

Fortunately neither the pilot nor co-pilot suffered injuries.

A wedding photographer was accidentally shot dead after he asked the happy couple to pose with guns as part of the big day celebrations, Italian police have revealed.

Calogero Scimea, 45, was hit in the head after one of the guns went off.

He died in front of horrified bride Valentina Anitra, 22, and groom Ignazio Licodia, 25, as well as their parents.

Police said the tragedy happened just before the couple, who are teenage sweethearts, set off for their local church at Altofonte near Palermo on the island of Sicily.

Police were on Tuesday questioning them as well as their relatives.

Prosecutors said the groom’s parents rail worker Mario, 56, and his wife Rita, face possible charges of negligence leading to manslaughter, as the tragedy happened at their house.

Officers said the bride’s parents, who live nearby, were also asked if they had any guns and went home to bring one of their own. All the firearms were legally held.

Ballistics experts have also been called in to examine the weapons, which were hunting rifles kept for shooting mainly wild boar in the nearby hills and countryside.

Palermo police spokesman Colonel Teo Luzi said: “From what we have been able to establish the photographer had asked the parents of the bride and groom if they had any guns to use as props in a picture and one went off hitting him in the head killing him.

“He was only there as a favour for the wedding photographer who had been originally been booked but had to pull out as he was ill. The bride and groom were distraught and the wedding was immediately cancelled.

“The prosecutor is looking at bringing charges against the groom’s parents as this is where the death took place but we need to examine the ballistics report first as the bride’s parents also brought a weapon.”

He added: “The firearms were legally held but in the interests of safety they should all be kept safe and not be handled by people who are not used to them and have no experience.

“What we are trying to establish is if the gun went off as it was being handled by the photographer or if it went off as it was handed to him but no-one is being very talkative.”

In southern Italy and especially Sicily it is common for guns to be fired at family events or festivals as part of the celebrations and in the past this has led to numerous deaths and injuries especially around New Year.

Altofonte’s deputy mayor Angela Busellini said: “No-one can believe it. Everybody is in a state of shock. It’s such a tragic accident. The bride and groom are devastated.” – [Story by Nick Pisa,Daily Mail]

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Police were on Wednesday following leads on the whereabouts of gunmen who shot the chief financial officer for FIFA’s local organising committee outside his home in Sandton, Johannesburg, a spokesperson said.

“I can’t really tell you what happened, but we were called to attend to a shooting at Gallo Manor at about 10 in the morning yesterday [Tuesday],” said Captain Kym Cloete.

Farouk Seedat, 52, was rushed to hospital after being shot in what police believe to be a house robbery.

Police were investigating cases of attempted robbery and attempted murder.

A spokesperson for a hospital where Seedat was admitted said that he was in a stable condition, the Star newspaper reported.

- SAPA

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Firearms, Accidents and Road Safety

The water treatment plant at the Grootvlei mine near Springs will flood with acid mine water in five days, closing down operations, if action is not taken, the water affairs department said on Tuesday.

“The plant is only pumping 40 megalitres of acid mine water a day, but it needs to pump 108 megalitres a day to stop it from flooding,” the department’s acting director of institutional establishment, Marius Keet said during a visit to the mine, owned by Aurora Empowerment Systems.

“Fortunately Aurora have said they have acquired the equipment to pump more and will be installing it in the next few days.”

The department’s portfolio committee, representatives from the departments of water affairs and mineral resources, and members of the DA were also part of the visiting delegation.

Acid mine drainage was affecting the Western, Central and Eastern Basins of the Witwatersrand gold fields area, which had negatively affected the Vaal and the Crocodile River systems.

Acid water is formed underground when old shafts and tunnels fill up. The water oxidises with the sulphide mineral iron pyrite, better known as fool’s gold. The water then fills the mine and starts decanting into the environment, in a process known as acid mine drainage.

Keet said if the toxic water, a legacy of 120 years of gold mining in the region, was left to rise from underground, it would flood the basins and have catastrophic consequences for the environment, human and animal life and future mining.

The polluted water was currently 600 metres below Johannesburg and, if left unchecked, would spill onto the streets in about 18 months, damaging buildings in the CBD.

Aurora’s general manager Louis Lamsley said they were “struggling to keep their heads above water”.

“We are an extremely stressed operation financially,” he said referring to claims the company had paid up to R100m in the last nine months to maintain the mine water treatment plant, which still seemed to be on the brink of disaster.

Grootvlei was the only mine in the Eastern Basin pumping out acid water. It only pumped intermittently and had been accused of only partially treating the water and discharging it into the Blesbok Spruit.

The department opened a criminal case against Aurora after it allegedly failed to comply with a directive to treat the pumped water before discharging it. The matter was currently under investigation by the police and the Blue Scorpions.

Acid mine water started flooding the pump station in June after workers, angered by months of not being paid, downed tools.

“We are supposed to be receiving a R5m subsidy from the state, but we have not received this since October last year,” said Zondwa Mandela, Aurora’s managing director and former president Nelson Mandela’s grandson. “It costs R6.5m [per month] to run the plant,” he said.

Aurora called on government to assist them financially.

Chair of the department of water affairs’ portfolio committee, Maggie Sotyu, said: “We are visiting the areas so we can assess what needs to be done to fix the problem, and we will compile a report to hand to Parliament in a month’s time, but the situation is serious so we will need to intervene before that.”

[Info from Fin24.com]

A Lufthansa cargo plane crashed at King Khaled International Airport in the Saudi capital on Tuesday but there were no casualties, the kingdom’s civil aviation authority said.

“The firefighters are containing the fire,” said a spokesman for the General Authority of Civil Aviation, adding there were no casualties.

Two pilots are being treated in hospital, the German carrier said in a statement.

Al Arabiya television earlier reported the cargo plane had split in half.

[RIYADH (AlArabiya, Agencies)]

Two women were injured when a plane crashed after take-off at Louis Trichardt airstrip on Tuesday morning, Limpopo police said.

The pilot and passenger, both in their 50s, took off but the plane failed to gain altitude before tumbling to the ground, Captain Maano Sadiki said.

Witnesses saw the plane coming to a halt a distance from the airstrip, near Tshikota township.

The women sustained minor injuries and were rushed off to a local hospital for treatment.

Civil aviation authorities were investigating the cause of the accident.

- SAPA

A man was killed and a woman seriously injured in an accident in Cape Town on Monday morning, paramedics said.

“A collision between an Uno and a Toyota Fortuner, on Vissershok road, near the N7, left one person dead and another injured this morning,” said ER24 spokesman Tristan Wadeley.

The male driver of the Uno died on the scene while the Toyota’s woman driver was taken to Durbanville Medi-Clinic in a stable condition.

“It is alleged that the driver of the Uno may have lost control of the vehicle resulting in the collision. Police were on scene and are investigating the incident,” said Wadeley. – Sapa

A 28 year old man is fighting for his life after he was shot in his chest by alleged robbers.
Paramedics rushed to the scene and found the man lying outside a take away shop in Lenasia. The man had a wound to his chest and was in a critical condition.

On further assessment paramedics found that the man had sustained possible injuries to his spine as well. The man had to be rushed off to a nearby hospital for further medical treatment.

Paramedics could not establish the full identity of the man on the scene and he was transported to a provincial hospital for further stabilisation. During the course of this morning paramedics assisted employees of the shop to arrange further information about the man.

It was later established that the man is the manager of the take away shop and was busy locking up when the incident took place. He was later airlifted from the provincial hospital by the Medicopter to Milpark hospital for further medical management.

The police attended the incident.

Werner Vermaak

ER24