Quebec drilling company fined $60K after worker seriously injured in northern Ont.

Quebec company fined $60K for northern Ont. injury A Quebec drilling company has been fined $60,000 after a worker was injured while on the job in Black River-Matheson in 2023.

A Quebec drilling company has been fined $60,000 after a worker was injured while on the job in Black River-Matheson in February 2023.

The incident took place on Highway 101 East involving an employee of Technic-Eau Drillings Inc., based in Sherbrooke, Que.

“A worker was unloading boxes from an idling crawling carrier that was parked beside a pickup truck,” the Ministry of Labour said in a news release.

“The worker failed to apply the parking brake before exiting the crawling carrier. When exiting the vehicle, the worker then accidentally made contact with its control levers.”

That caused the vehicle to move toward the parked pickup truck, “causing serious injuries to the worker who was between the two vehicles,” the release said.

The company failed to ensure that the crawling carrier’s parking brake was applied before the worker exited the vehicle, as required by the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

Following a guilty plea in provincial offences court in Timmins, the company was fined $60,000 by Justice of the Peace Estelle Thérese Bérubé.

The court also imposed a 25 per cent victim fine surcharge as required by the Provincial Offences Act. The surcharge is credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.

The offence took place Feb. 1, 2023, and the company was convicted at hearing held June 27, 2024.