Farmer fatally crushed after jumping from tractor cabin

Background

During harvest, a contractor was operating a large tractor with an empty 20-tonne trailer. The contractor appeared to lose control of the tractor while traveling down a steep slope towards a creek. The contractor made the decision to jump from the cabin and was subsequently run over by the attached trailer, sustaining fatal injuries.

Agriculture makes up just two percent of Victoria's workforce but regularly accounts for about 10% of all workplace deaths.

About 70% of these deaths have involved farm machinery over the last 5 years. Working on or around tractors and attachments is the leading cause of fatalities on farms.

Safety issues

Not using safety devices

Jumping from a tractor during a rollover or loss of control is extremely dangerous. The operator can be struck or crushed by the tractor or any attached equipment, such as a trailer.

Since 1982, Australian legislation has required tractors to be fitted with a compliant ROPS to improve operator safety. Seatbelts and ROPS, together, save lives. Remaining inside the protective zone created by the ROPS, with a correctly worn seatbelt, is the safest place to be.

Recommended ways of controlling the risks

Trust the ROPS

• What is the ROPS
  A ROPS is a reinforced frame or cab designed to hold up the weight of the tractor during a rollover. The ROPS creates a protective zone, significantly reducing the risk of the operator being crushed by the tractor if it rolls over or flips backwards.
• How it Works 
  ROPS works by maintaining a survival space during a rollover. When combined with a correctly worn seatbelt, the operator is kept inside this protective zone, reducing the risk of crush injuries. Wearing a seatbelt is critical —without it, the operator can be thrown outside the protective zone. When ROPS are removed or folded down, the protective zone is no longer available to protect the operator.

Always wear a seatbelt

WorkSafe commissioned Quantum Market Research to better understand the barriers and enablers to seatbelt use on tractors and side-by-side vehicles on farms.

The research shows that many farm vehicle operators still underestimate the importance of wearing a seatbelt. While operators acknowledge that vehicles have become safer and that overall attitudes to safe operation have improved, their views on seatbelts have not shifted. Many believe safety comes from skill, control and experience rather than restraint systems, and some see seatbelt use as unnecessary — even a sign of inexperience.

Familiarity with the terrain can create a false sense of security, making the risk of serious injury feel distant. Operators also report that seatbelts feel inconvenient during frequent stops, and many have normalised workarounds such as buckling belts behind them or silencing alarms. Crucially, the research shows there is limited understanding of how ROPS and seatbelts work together to prevent fatal crush injuries by keeping the operator inside the protective zone during a rollover.

Understanding these attitudes matters, because many of the beliefs identified in the research directly increase the likelihood of fatal outcomes. Improving awareness of how seatbelts and ROPS function together — and challenging misconceptions about skill being a substitute for safety — is essential to reducing preventable deaths on farms.

Systems of work

• Where possible, install seatbelt monitoring systems such as seatbelt interlocks, warning alarms, AI camera system that detect seatbelts or monitoring systems that notify the farm managers if a vehicle is moving and a seatbelt is not being worn.
• Always wear a seatbelt when operating a tractor.
• Remain in the ROPS with your seatbelt correctly worn until the tractor is safely parked.
• Regularly discuss seatbelt usage on your farms (for example, tool box talks).
• Regularly perform safety observations to ensure that seatbelts are being worn.
• Regularly inspect equipment to ensure the ROPS is structurally sound and seatbelts are in good condition, are being used, operational and safety devices are not being bypassed.
• Conduct a safety assessment of the proposed path. The risk of rollover increases on steep or uneven ground.

Legal Duties

Under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (OHS Act), tractors are regulated as ‘plant’ and employers have duties which they must fulfil so far as is reasonably practicable. Their duties include the following:

• Providing and maintaining a working environment that is safe and without risks to health.
• Providing and maintaining plant and systems of work that are safe and without risks to health.
• Maintaining a workplace under their management and control in a condition that is safe and without risks to health.
• Ensuring people who are not employees are not exposed to risks to their health and safety arising from the conduct of their undertaking.
• Consulting with your employees and contractors on occupational health and safety topics that relate to your workplace and directly affect them.

Employers also have a duty to provide employees and independent contractors with information, instruction, training or supervision as is necessary for them to perform work safely and without risks to health.

Self-employed persons must ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that persons are not exposed to risks to their health or safety arising from the conduct of their undertaking.

The Occupational Health and Safety Regulations 2017 (the Regulations) also outline specific measures that are relevant to the use of plant (including tractors). Employers and self-employed people must also, so far as is reasonably practicable:

• identify all hazards associated with the use of plant at the workplace
• control risks associated with plant according to the plant hierarchy of control
• ensure the plant is inspected to the extent necessary to ensure that risks associated with its use are monitored
• ensure plant that is not in use is left in a state that does not create a risk for any person.

The Regulations prohibit employers and self-employed persons from using tractors not fitted with ROPS (except under very limited circumstances).

In addition to the mandatory ROPS, the Regulations also require employers and self-employed persons to employ specific risk control measures to ensuring that tractors (as powered mobile plant) do not overturn and operators are not ejected out of the tractor. This includes ensuring that as far as is reasonably practicable, an appropriate combination of operator protective devices is provided, maintained and used to reduce these risks. Operator protective devices include restraining devices and seat belts.

Employees have a general duty under the OHS Act to take reasonable care for their own health and safety and to take reasonable care for the health and safety of others who may be affected by their acts or omissions at the workplace.

While at work, an employee must not intentionally or recklessly interfere with or misuse anything provided at the workplace in the interests of health, safety or welfare.