A coroner has connected the death of a former worker at Goodyear’s Wolverhampton factory to years of employment in tyre production. Fred Spruce died in November 2015, just weeks after he was diagnosed with bladder cancer. His 71-year-old widow Valerie has now instructed industrial disease lawyers at Irwin Mitchell to investigate how this happened.
Kent-based tyre company Watling Tyre Service Limited has been fine £1 million and will have to pay almost 10 per cent more on top as costs after it was sentenced for safety failings. The case follows the death of 21-year-old Matthew Hoare, from Canterbury in an incident that took place 10 years ago.
Pirelli representatives attended a procedural hearing at Carlisle Crown Court on 6 October in the ongoing case related to death of George Falder. The hearing saw the judge sets the timescales for the next steps of the case.
An explosion at Zhongrong Metal Products Co Ltd killed at least 70 people on 2 August. One source put the figure as high as 75. According to the local People’s Daily newspaper, 44 died in the initial blast with others being pronounced dead in hospital. National broadcaster CCTV reported that 187 others were injured in the blast, although other sources put this figure at 200 or more.
Criminal activity has been ruled out in the investigation into the death of Pirelli employee George Falder. Tests show that the 48-year old employee at the tyre maker’s Carlisle factory was not assaulted before he died inside one of the plant’s autoclaves.
Further details of the lethal incident at Pirelli’s Dalton Road, Carlisle tyre production factory have emerged with various sources naming the victim as George Falder, 48 from Carlisle. According to local police Falder was found dead inside an autoclave at about 18:00 BST on Sunday 30 September. Contrary to earlier news reports, the autoclave was not used in the retreading of tyres as Pirelli exclusively produces new passenger car and 4×4 tyres at the Dalton road facility. Instead, company representatives clarified that the autoclave in question was used in the curing of beads used in the construction of new tyres.
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