Serious Accidents 2005 - 2009
Henkel openly reports serious accidents. A serious accident refers to the lethal injury of a Henkel employee or an employee of a contractor carrying out work for Henkel. In 2006, 2007 and 2009 no fatal occupational accidents were suffered by Henkel employees or employees of contractors carrying out work on Henkel sites. Sadly, a Henkel employee died in a plane crash in the USA while on a business trip. The accidents and the preventive measures initiated as a result of these are shown below.
Serious Accidents 2008
| Accident | Measures initiated |
| A sales employee in Russia died in a traffic accident on his way to a customer. |
Two further Henkel employees and one employee of an external company who was carrying out work for Henkel died in accidents that happened during working time, but were unrelated to their actual work. We report these accidents for reasons of transparency, as they fall to some extent under the OECD’s definition of an occupational accident (OECD = Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), or were reported in the local press:
- On his way to a business meeting in Italy, a Henkel employee from Great Britain died when his motorcycle was involved in an accident in Germany. The use of a motorcycle is not in conformity with the Henkel guidelines for business travel, but was not expressly forbidden by our subsidiary.
- An employee of an external company engaged to support Henkel’s sales activities in Huixquilucan, Mexico, was fatally injured by falling doors in a DIY center. The accident occurred in a barred no-entry area and was totally unrelated to the work of the external company’s employee.
- A Henkel field sales employee attempted to prevent a theft outside our site at Xuzhou, Jiangsu, China, and was fatally injured by the thieves, although the emergency services were on the spot within five minutes. The culprits were subsequently caught.
Serious Accidents 2005
Tuzla, Turkey, May 8, 2005
| Accident/operational incident | Measures initiated |
| An employee of a contractor engaged by Henkel fell from a height of 10 meters while carrying out cleaning work on a silo. He died from his injuries. To make his work easier, he had removed a section of grating from the floor of the work platform, and later fell through this opening. | All sites were informed about the accident and instructed to inform their own employees and contractors’ employees regularly and emphatically about the possible consequences of unsafe behavior. Workplace safety analyses should also factor in unlikely but not impossible risks. |
Engels, Russia, Oct. 6, 2005
| Accident/operational incident | Measures initiated |
| An employee of a construction firm engaged by Henkel died when the walls of a trench collapsed and buried him. The employee was present in the trench despite the fact that work on a new sewer system had been halted. Continuous rainfall had softened the soil. | All sites were informed about the accident and made aware of the importance of emphasizing the necessity of compliance with safety standards to the supervisory staff of contractors, and of closely monitoring such compliance. In addition, sites worldwide were informed about the necessary safety measures to be taken when work is carried out in trenches. |