A construction worker was killed at a Brooklyn, New York worksite on the day before Thanksgiving by a piece of sheet metal that fell from an unapproved forklift.
News sources say 44-year-old Over Paredes of Newark, New Jersey was working on the roof of a six-story condo development when a manual forklift that was hoisting part of a metal-framed wall topped onto its side, releasing the metal. The city’s Department of Buildings (DOB) had reportedly approved the use of a powered forklift at the site — not the manual type that was involved in the incident.
Witnesses said Parades’ son - who also worked at that jobsite, along with two of Parades’ brothers - was inconsolable at the scene of his father’s accident.
City inspectors issued a full stop-work order for the project and launched an investigation to determine, among other things, if the machine operator was licensed to operate either type of forklift. The contractor, Empire ID Construction, was issued a violation failure to safeguard workers. A DOB spokesperson said the agency’s investigation is ongoing and more violations could be issued.
Empire ID Construction was responsible for 1.87M square feet of construction between January 2012 and March 2017.