Workers say trench collapse could have been prevented

Tuesday, Sept. 28, 1999 | 1:40 a.m.

Workers at a water treatment plant-expansion project in Henderson said Monday that the collapse of a trench that killed one person Sept. 16 could have been avoided if contractors had heeded warnings or followed federal safety laws.

The accident occurred when the walls of a 20-foot deep, 25-foot wide and 30-foot long trench collapsed as workers were laying pipe in an $8 million expansion of Henderson's water treatment plant.

Kenn Egbert, 36, of St. George, Utah, was killed and two others were injured in the accident. Egbert was co-owner of Xpert Xcavating, the Utah-based subcontractor digging the trench.

Jacob Prieto, a cement mason who worked at the site and was fired after the accident, said he complained to the subcontractor and the general contractor, Ellsworth-Peck, several times before the accident that the trench was unsafe and in violation of federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration rules. He said the representatives from Ellsworth-Peck told him that "there was no money in the budget" to shore up the sides of the trench as required by OSHA rules.

Ellsworth-Peck, based in Utah, has a record of almost three-dozen violations of OSHA standards at seven worksites in Nevada, Utah, Colorado and Wyoming since 1994. As general contractor, Ellsworth-Peck is responsible for overseeing safety standard compliance on the work site.

In May the Colorado OSHA fined the company $12,000 for multiple "serious" violations of workplace rules governing trench excavations, an on-line search of the national OSHA records revealed.

Prieto said Egbert also was concerned about the lack of supports for the walls and had complained to Ellsworth-Peck a day before the accident.

The company, Prieto said, responded by saying the death was Egbert's fault because if he knew it was unsafe, "he shouldn't have gone down there."

Prieto, a 21-year-veteran of the industry, said the company cited "misrepresentation of the facts" for his dismissal.

Prieto said he is a member of Operative Plasterers and Cement Masons Local 979. The union had tried to organize workers at the site, he said.

Current workers on the site, who asked not to be identified for fear of losing their jobs, confirmed that workers had complained about the safety conditions at the Henderson project. Three workers said the trench was visibly unsafe and clearly in violation of the OSHA rules.

Although federal OSHA rules call for "adequate protective systems" to ensure that walls do not collapse when a trench or excavation is deeper than 5 feet, there were no restraints in place in Henderson to shore up the walls, workers and observers said.

"They should have had something in there," said John Gambatese, director of UNLV's construction management program and advisor to the Associated General Contractors of Las Vegas, a construction contractor trade group. "You have to have some kind of protection if it's deeper than 5 feet."

He described several methods, including wood bracing and box frames. But the preferred method is sloping the walls of a trench so that a collapse is impossible, Gambatese said.

Richard Ellsworth, Ellsworth-Peck president, said his 15-year-old company has never before had a serious accident at a worksite.

"This was a devastating thing for all of us," Ellsworth said. "We have a substantial safety budget, we have a full-time safety director, we have a company safety program, which we try to enforce seriously."

Ellsworth said he knew the victim personally.

"We work hard to stop these (accidents); it is personally sad for me that we didn't in this case," Ellsworth said.

The Nevada Division of Industrial Relations/OSHA, which monitors workplace conditions and inspects complaints of safety violations under the federal OSHA structure, is conducting an investigation of the accident. Jimmy Garrett, a safety officer with the Las Vegas office, declined to comment on the investigation, which he said could take several months to complete.

Fines for violations could range from a few thousand dollars to over $100,000, Roger Bremner, administrator for the state's OSHA division, said from Carson City.

Variables involved in setting the cost of a penalty include the level of severity and number of violations and the number of people exposed to a hazard, said Steve Coffield, a safety supervisor in the Las Vegas OSHA office.

Ellsworth-Peck had a safety superintendent on site who conducted daily safety inspections, said Doug Korth, a company representative in Las Vegas.

Subcontractor Xpert Xcavating was "told to do what they needed to do to be safe," Korth said.

He said the company is cooperating with the OSHA investigation.

No problems or accidents had been recorded prior to the trench collapse, said Dennis Porter, Henderson's assistant utilities services manager. He said the water-treatment plant expansion began in October 1998 and should be complete in March.

He said the city does not do a search of OSHA violations or fines when contracts are awarded. The contracts are advertised to the public and any licensed contractor can bid, Porter said.