Hello Techs,

A terrible accident resulting in death happened Friday at a nearby Buick, Pontiac, GMC dealership. A car apparently fell off of a hydraulic lift which took this mechanic’s life.

http://www.myfoxstl.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=8150953&version=2&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.1.1

A few of you know about my experience when lifting a one-ton truck a couple of months ago. That was a very close call for me.

Be careful out there guys.

Carl, in your case what went wrong...?  What type of lift was it...?

Hi Joe,

I appreciate your interest and this is a very important issue to all of us in the trenches.

After speaking with my father about what happened to me, he was shocked. He called me Saturday wondering if I knew anything about the fatality. I said, "yes Pop, I heard about it, but don't have many details on it." He said, "trust me son, I'll follow through on this and find out what happened." You would have to know my father. When he says something like that, he means it. More information will be passed on as it comes in.

Oh yes... the death lift. You know, I've always been really careful when
racking a vehicle, but this happened to be my special day. I'm working with a 10k lift so I figure I'm ok lifting a one ton. Wrong! I almost got
the tires off of the ground when all of a sudden the post came crashing into the rollbar behind the cab. Whew! I'm yelling, "will someone come over and see if my heart is still beating?" The post pulled up a sheet of concrete about 8 feet long by 4 feet wide. The rack was lifting it fine, the floor decided to check out. I'm glad I wasn't under it when that happened. Stupid Mohawk lifts. They should have a cross brace across the top. This one didn't have that. What is even more disturbing is that they intstalled two more Mohawk lifts in another shop without this cross-brace. I tried to explain this simple concept, but it fell on deaf ears. I just don't get it. Why is this simple concept so hard to understand?

 I think another improvement  would be rubber between the car lift point and the feet or bars we place under them... the steel to steel contact is an accident waiting to happen. It could go up. but not handle being disturbed; in some case.  It doesn't seem to happen so often.  Perhaps it does when complacency has come knockin'.

Carl,

Hmmm... it pulled up the concrete floor it was anchored to... that's quite disasterous... at least you had the "awareness" to stand clear while lifting; good thing you came out of it safe.

Joe

The name of the 47 year old Mechanic has been released. Also his residence was in DeSoto, Mo. which is a substantial distance from his place of employment.

The important thing here is to find out how it happened and what can be done to avoid such a catastrophe in the future.

I've already planned on visiting the former shop I was employed at to give a presentation. Honestly, I can't tell you how well that will be received. After that I'll go to the Behlmann store to see if I can find out anymore information. There again, I'm not sure how well that will be received.

I made this commitent to investigate and report so that if I can help save a fellow techs life, then it was worth it.

Rest in peace Mr. David Hampton.

You are a good man Carl.  Glad ou are doing something to prevent future problems.  I think too many people take this stuff for granted and awareness is important..