LESS than one week before April 28, slated for the observance of International Occupational Health and Safety Day, 28-year-old Jeremey Ames tragically lost his life at the construction site of the new Giftland OfficeMax Mall at Liliendaal, East Coast Demerara.The labourer, of Plaisance, East Coast Demerara, was said to have been working in a container yesterday when a large quantity of dislodged mirrors which were to be installed in washrooms and walkways of the massive shopping complex, each measuring about 12 ft x 10 ft, came crashing down on him, killing him almost instantly.

Other employees on the scene rushed to Ames’s assistance; but judging from the weight and quantity of mirrors, it is very likely he had died almost instantly on being hit.

His body did not appear to have suffered extensive mutilation, but he is believed to have sustained several broken limbs and massive internal injuries.

He was rushed to the Woodlands Hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival, plunging his relatives in deep and inconsolable grief. Ames had been working with the company for the last three months.

His body was later removed to the Lyken Funeral Parlour on Norton Street in Newburg, Georgetown. An autopsy is expected to be performed tomorrow.

Earlier this week, 18-year-old Wazeem Samad of Mon Repos was working at the construction site of the Camp Street Food Court, off the corner of Camp Street and North Road, when he fell to the ground through the elevator shaft hole three storeys up from the six-storey building now under construction. Wazeem suffered injuries to his head and face, and is currently in the Male Surgical Ward of the Georgetown Public Hospital.

The carpentry sub-contractor Richard Collins, under whom Wazeem worked, refuted claims that his men work without the protection of occupational health and safety gear. He said that he, at all times, insists that the men secure such gear and be suitably attired for the task at hand before beginning to work.

Nevertheless, when Wazeem Samad fell, he was wearing no helmet.

Collins told the Guyana Chronicle that when Samad fell, he was just proceeding on lunch break and had taken off his safety gear. Samad’s fall, suffered last Saturday, has brought to three the number of such incidents at that particular worksite.

Collins agrees, but he could not say what systems are being put in place to avoid such recurrences, and what compensation arrangement is being worked out to take care of the injured man for the time he would be off the job and unable to work.

And about two months ago, another worker at the five-storey Boxer’s Jewellery edifice under construction on Hadfield Street fell from the fifth floor to the ground, and was wearing no safety gear at the time. He, too, lives at Mon Repos, and had been hospitalised at the GPHC.

World Day for Safety and Health at Work is being observed on April 28, 2014. The day was declared by the International Labour Organization (ILO) to promote the prevention of occupational accidents and diseases globally.

World Day for Safety and Health at Work is an awareness-raising campaign “intended to focus international attention on emerging trends in the field of occupational safety and health, and on the magnitude of work-related injuries, diseases and fatalities worldwide”.
By Shirley Thomas