Wigan depot worker seriously injured after being run over by his own pallet truck

The worker’s left leg was trapped under the heavy machinery which also pinned him up against shelving in the freak incident at the Ingersoll-Rand engineering plant on Swan Lane, Hindley Green.

Fire crews from Hindley, Atherton and Leigh faced a race against the clock to free the stricken 35-year-old as paramedics were unable to treat him properly until he was released.

Air bags were used to lift the stand-on electric vehicle off him, after which ambulance workers could cannulate him, put him on a stretcher, treat the serious injury to his left leg and rush him to the major trauma unit at Salford Royal Hospital.

Police were also in attendance at the incident which was reported at 10.30pm on Tuesday August 15 and the Health and Safety Executive has launched an inquiry.

No-one else was near the vehicle when the incident happened and Hindley fire station watch manager Kieran Reid said that he believed the operator might have caught a lever as he dismounted from the vehicle, causing it to lurch backwards and trap him against the racking.

Paramedics were first on the scene and were assessing the casualty, who was in a sitting position with his leg curled under the truck, when the fire crews arrived. He had also suffered an injury to the back of his head when cracking it on the shelving.

Watch manager Reid said: “The man said he was also having difficulty breathing but that may have been the shock.

"Because the paramedics couldn’t attend to him properly, it was time-critical that we freed him; so, under their guidance, we used air bags to lift the truck off his leg which had sustained significant injuries. Then they were able to package him up and get him off to hospital.”

The worker was trapped for around half an hour, his colleagues who rang 999 being told not to try to free him themselves and leave it to the emergency services.

A spokesman for Greater Manchester Police confirmed that they were called to premises in Swan Lane at 10.40pm last night where a 35-year-old man had suffered “multiple serious injuries.”