Peterhead-based Lunar Freezing and Cold Storage has been fined £245,000 after one of its employees was dragged into a machine through a gap where a safety guard should have been installed on 19 August 2025.
Aged 30 at the time of the incident, the man was working as a chargehand on a production line at the company’s premises at Peterhead Harbour in Aberdeenshire.
The worker’s injuries occurred when he stopped to deal with a box that had jammed too high up in a rack loader cage to be reached from the ground.
He entered the production line through a gap in the guarding without isolating the power, then climbed onto the conveyor and pressed down on the lid to release the jam.
The machine restarted and his right arm was pulled into the pusher section of the rack loader.
Unable to free himself, he was drawn further into the mechanism until his head made contact with moving parts. A colleague who heard his shouts for help isolated the power and stopped the machine.
As a result of the incident, the man suffered a fractured jaw, chest injuries and arm trauma, and subsequently required surgery to insert metal plates into his jaw.
After spending three days in hospital, he returned to work several weeks later on 29 September 2025 and has since made a full recovery.
The subsequent investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that a section of fixed guarding next to the production line had been removed during maintenance around two weeks before the incident and had not been reinstated.
Without the guard, the gap gave access to the machine without the power being isolated. The correct route into the machine, through an interlocked gate, would have switched off the machinery as soon as the gate was opened.
HSE found that while the guard was missing, staff had used the gap to reach the machinery on various occasions when boxes jammed, rather than using the interlocked gate.
Maintenance staff told HSE they had seen the guard missing and had seen employees using the gap, but it was not reinstated.
The weekly inspection checklist used by the in-house maintenance team did not include checks on the integrity of non-electrical fixed guarding.
Had the guarding been in place, the only way into the machine would have been through the interlocked gate and the incident would not have happened.
HSE guidance highlights the importance of following safe isolation and lock-off procedures before any maintenance or cleaning work is carried out.
Employers must ensure all machinery is properly isolated from power sources and that systems are regularly monitored and reviewed to prevent inadvertent start-up.
Lunar Freezing and Cold Storage Company Ltd, of East Quay, The Harbour, Peterhead, pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 11(1) and (2) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 and Section 33(1)(c) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.
The company was fined £245,000 and ordered to pay a victim surcharge of £18,375 at Peterhead Sheriff Court on 28 October 2026.
HSE inspector Nicky Smith said: “This was a wholly preventable incident which left a worker seriously injured. A missing guard and an unchecked gap left the way open for a worker to be dragged into a machine.
“Guards must be kept in place, and checks must cover every guard, not just the electrical ones.”
