Liam McArdle, from Gravesend was fatally crushed by an excavator attachment while working for Erith Plant Services Limited on 21 September 2021.

A demolition grab, attached to an excavator, fell onto the 24-year-old while it was loaded onto a lorry at Erith Plant Services Limited’s workshop at Eastern Quarry on Watling Steet, Swanscombe.

An HSE investigation into the incident found Erith Plant Services Limited failed to ensure there was a safe method of work while loading and unloading excavators and attachments.

The company failed to ensure steps were taken to ensure HGV drivers fully engaged the quick hitch when moving attachments during loading and unloading activities. There was also no defined segregation between vehicles and pedestrians at the firm’s Eastern Quarry workshop, nor was there suitable supervision of work activities.

Victim Liam McArdle

Laim’s father Declan McArdle said in his victim personal statement: “The pain of losing my son has been and will continue to be unbearable. Liam worked hard and wanted to learn. He wanted to follow in my footsteps, and I was proud of the person he was becoming.

“Liam and I enjoyed spending time together. We would go on truck rallies and to car racing events together. Liam would never really say: ‘I love you, dad.’ It just wasn’t his way.

“Rather, he would ask me to go to a racing event with him and I knew that this was Liam’s way of saying he loved me. Liam and I were planning on going to a racing event in February 2022. I went to the event, and I took Liam’s ashes with me so that we could still go together.”

Erith Plant Services Limited, of Erith, Kent pleaded guilty to safety breaches and  was fined £175,000 and ordered to pay £37,804 in costs at Woolwich Crown Court.

HSE inspector Joanne Williams said: “This tragic death serves as an important reminder that workers need to be trained and that there is always the potential for an attachment to fall during the operation of excavators. Employers need to ensure that work practices are maintained to keep workers away from the danger areas during lifting activities.”