Brasfield & Gorrie Construction Site Accidents May Be Cause for Litigation

• September 6, 2024
• Attorney Matt Stoddard
• Construction Accidents

Brasfield & Gorrie is responsible for the safety of thousands of people working one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Even a small misjudgment or malfunction on a construction site can end or irrevocably alter lives in an instant, as the survivors of Brasfield & Gorrie accidents know all too well. When an accident happens, injured construction workers and their families deserve honest answers as to what happened, and compensation for their losses.

Workers on Brasfield & Gorrie Sites Are Vulnerable to the Construction “Fatal Four”

The majority of serious construction accidents fall into one of four categories, which OSHA has dubbed the “Fatal Four” or “Focus Four.” Workplace safety organizations, including but not limited to OSHA, put a great deal of emphasis on raising awareness of these four main threats. By now, every U.S construction company knows, or should know, how real a danger these accidents pose, and the recommended precautions to prevent them.

Electrical Accidents

Not all construction workers are trained electricians, but virtually all of them will end up working around electrical systems, which may be new and unfinished, or aging and in need of repair. When excavating a site, or tearing into the existing walls of a building, there’s always the danger of running into an unmarked or unmapped electrical cable.

The electrical systems of structures being built, demolished, or altered aren’t the only sources of live current on a construction site, either.

In 2014, a Brasfield & Gorrie employee died while constructing the Airbus factory in Mobile, Alabama. He was reportedly setting up temporary power for use on the site when he received a fatal electric shock.

Stuck-In/Stuck-Between Accidents

“Stuck-in” or “stuck-between” accidents typically happen when a person falls into a large piece of machinery, or gets pinched between a machine’s moving parts and a solid object. “Stuck-in” accidents can also happen with non-mechanized hazards, such as collapsing trenches.

When working around potential crushing or entanglement hazards, it’s vital to keep track of likely danger areas, and to make sure anyone who enters those areas is alert to the danger and actively performing a necessary task.

Without this awareness, even efforts to make worksites safer can pose a threat.

In 2007, at a Brasfield & Gorrie construction site in Madison, Tennessee, a worker was preparing to move a reinforcing trench box into a freshly dug trench, using a track hoe. During the maneuver, the hoe’s counterweight hit the box and pushed it into a nearby wall, fatally crushing another worker who was standing in between.

Falls

Working construction on multi-story structures naturally involves working at heights where a fall means certain death. The walls, guardrails, and other features that will protect the eventual occupants of a structure are not yet in place for the people building that structure, so construction companies need to take their own fall safety precautions.

Construction falls can be caused by poor communication and coordination during complex maneuvers. Back in 2000, a Brasfield & Gorrie crew was constructing a 15-story office building in Nashville, Tennessee. In order to move a scissor lift to an upper floor of the structure, they loaded the lift, with one worker already in its cab, into the material bucket of a crane. The crane operator raised the bucket to the upper level, where the scissor lift operator was supposed to drive the lift out of the bucket onto the floor. Unfortunately, the crane operator lowered the bucket too early, while the lift was still half in the bucket and half on the floor. The lift fell 80 feet to the ground outside, killing its operator.

More often, however, fall accidents happen in situations where using fall protection would be simple, but the construction company hasn’t made it a priority.

In 2002, a Brasfield & Gorrie employee was trying to untangle the nylon lifting straps of a tower crane, while working at a height without a harness on a project in Birmingham, Alabama. He lost his balance and fell 50 feet to his death.

Struck-By Accidents

This is the biggest and broadest of the Fatal Four categories. Transportation accidents, the single most common cause of on-the-job death across all industries, often fall under this classification. Construction workers can be struck by vehicles even on closed job sites, but those working on public streets are particularly vulnerable.

A worker died this way in 2015, at a Brasfield & Gorrie work site along the US-280 highway in Birmingham, Alabama. He was directing traffic around the site when a car struck him from behind.

Struck-by accidents also include cases where the victim is struck by a falling or swinging object. In 2008, a Brasfield & Gorrie employee was testing the pressure on a new water line at a water treatment facility in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, when an unsecured section of pipe weighing thousands of pounds fell and crushed him.

Three workers were also injured in 2017, during the Brasfield & Gorrie construction of the Waterford Blue Lagoon business park in Miami, Florida, when a pair of scissor lifts tipped over on top of them.

The object in a struck-by accident doesn’t need to be a piece of equipment or new building material. In renovation projects, construction workers can be struck by falling pieces of unsound existing structures. Here in Georgia, under Brasfield & Gorrie’s leadership, three workers were injured this way during the renovation of the Tomochichi Federal Building and Savannah Courthouse last year.

Struck-by accidents are one of the most likely construction accidents to harm bystanders, in addition to workers. Brasfield & Gorrie had a close call with this phenomenon right here in Atalanta a few years ago. During work on a 31-story building on West Peachtree Street, a crane’s hydraulic cylinder failed, causing the crane to lean and become unstable. Thankfully, no one was hurt, but the surrounding apartment and office buildings had to be evacuated while the crew worked to stabilize the crane over the course of two days.

Brasfield & Gorrie Isn’t Always the Right Defendant

Suing Brasfield & Gorrie might seem like the intuitive move after a construction accident, but under worker’s comp law, it’s not always an option. The general rule is, if you’re eligible to collect worker’s compensation through Brasfield & Gorrie, you can’t file a lawsuit against Brasfield & Gorrie for the same incident, unless the company denies your worker’s comp claim.

This can be very frustrating for injured employees of Brasfield & Gorrie, and the families of employees killed in on-the-job accidents, because worker’s comp payments are typically much smaller than what a court would award in a legitimate personal injury or wrongful death case.

If you’re not eligible for worker’s compensation, or if your worker’s compensation would come from a different source, such as a subcontractor working on the same site, you may be able to sue Brasfield & Gorrie. Otherwise, the best way to collect full compensation is to look into other companies that may have contributed to your accident, such as:

• Equipment manufacturers — If anything malfunctioned during the accident, from a crane to a pair of safety glasses, the manufacturer could be liable.
• Maintenance providers — Some equipment failures result from poor upkeep, rather than design flaws. Any outside companies that provided maintenance services could also be liable if those services were inadequately performed.
• Other subcontractors — Just because Brasfield & Gorrie is the general contractor on a site doesn’t mean that other companies participating in the project aren’t responsible for good safety practices. Any subcontractors that contributed to creating an unsafe work environment could be valid defendants for a lawsuit.

If you’ve been injured or lost a loved one on a Brasfield & Gorrie worksite in Georgia, feel free to reach out by phone or chat to learn more about your options for justice.