Something to add to your risk assessment...

[Simon Lewis]

Organising or providing a firework display near a busy road? Fatal accidents caused because of poor visibility? It could lead to manslaughter charges....

[J Pearce]

I could see drifting haze/smoke from an outdoor stage causing similar issues, and a precedent is now set.

[kerry davies]

This is something that amazed me at the time of the accident. The fall-out zone appeared to be the actual motorway if you followed the guidance. Just in case anyone doesn't know the two guides are: HSG 124 and HSG 123

 

This video shows the crash site in relation to the rugby club where the display was, I was led to believe, set up in the bottom right hand corner of the site within 50 feet of the road.

 

To add; a tragedy which might have been avoided with a little more thought.

[Ynot]

This summer I was driving down the motorway on route to a well earned holiday and saw a huge cloud of brownish smoke up ahead. Turns out it was a dirt-bike/moto-cross track just off the motorway and it was such a dry day that the kick back from the bikes was horrendous.

Traffic had slowed considerably (just as well) going through it as it did reduce visibility.

 

 

[gareth]

What amazes me about this case is that, a while ago, a statement was issued absolving the display operator and the rugby club of any apparent blame for the incident - the findings of the investigation were that the wind was blowing in the wrong direction to have brought drifting smoke into play as a causal factor in the collisions on the motorway.

 

All I can think is that one of two things must be happening here : either a) the authorities are looking for a scapegoat in this case, and the fireworks industry is an easy target (the recent Hillsborough revelations have proved that the rozzers are definitely not shy of distorting the facts of a case to suit their own ends, pointing the finger of blame at the nearest convenient target regardless of the facts of a case) ; or b) the CPS has evidence which hasn't made it into the public domain so far, which in some way implicates the procedures being followed by the display operator.

 

All we can do is wait until the case comes to court and see what evidence is presented.

[ramdram]

Could it be, just possibly, the car insurers have lobbied, very hard and very discreetly, that this was not an Act of God and was a result of someone's negligence...who can then be sued by said insurers.

 

Perhaps this person's Public Liability insurer won't cough up either?

[gareth]

I'll be very interested to see how, based on what's been revealed so far regarding the findings of the extensive investigations into the incident, the CPS intend to attempt to prove *beyond reasonable doubt* that the display operator's actions contributed to the cause of this incident. Let's hope that they don't end up with a jury composed mainly of fervent firework-haters with an axe to grind :(.

[kerry davies]

The charges are due to his failings in the planning and operation of the display.

Though the information is not specific I think that the above police statement means that HASAWA may be used to prosecute and if so presumption of innocence will not apply. The accused has to prove his innocence rather than the prosecution prove his guilt. Did he do everything the law demands? Did he follow the guidance for displays? What were his RA arrangements? Since the site was well within 100 feet, not metres, of the carriageway that could all be difficult.

 

Gareth, back in March there was a newspaper report that fog had been blamed and the investigation halted. This was untrue and the police rebuttal gained no publicity, which is normal for our incompetent national press.

 

The insurance companies will not normally pay out during a criminal investigation so Ram is partially correct though motives are immaterial. Insurance adjusters will not allot culpability while the police and courts are involved.

 

My best guess from experience is that there was a lot of smoke (most people nowadays use fall-out free and low smoke devices?) and the normal November mist and temperature inversion built up a bank of smog hanging low over the carriageway. From reports the traffic slowed and stopped and the back of the queue was smashed into by trucks and cars following at motorway speeds. This aligns with the fact that the worst crash damage was 100/200 metres before the display site. There is a punter cellphone vid showing large amounts of ground effects with masses of smoke though it is too blurred to be relied upon. Here.

[gareth]

most people nowadays use fall-out free and low smoke devices

Not in the firework display business. Fireworks generate smoke, that's a given - and while the potential for actual burning fall-out is restricted to devices with long hang-times (willow shells, parachute effects, etc.) and is carefully controlled (by, for example, assigning different priority levels to such effects on a computerised firing script so that they can be isolated out of the display in the event of a change of wind conditions), other material fall-out such as candle bungs and shell casings can never really be eliminated - hence the provision of large fall-out zones around display sites.

[henny]

most people nowadays use fall-out free and low smoke devices

Not in the firework display business. Fireworks generate smoke, that's a given -

 

 

Fireworks generate a white hot smoke that rises very quickly

 

A bonfires on the other hand give off thick cooler so low hanging smoke

[Brian]

Fireworks generate a white hot smoke that rises very quickly

Not always (the last bit).

 

A couple of years ago I was involved in a large firework display which took place in a park on the edge of a town centre. Due to very strange atmospheric conditions all the smoke sat in a layer starting at about 8 feet off the ground where it stayed for several hours on site whilst also drifting into town and creating 'pea souper' conditions.

[slipstream]

A thermal inversion can cause the smoke to sit at ground level - pretty sure all the images I saw suggested the crash occurred 500m up wind of the fireworks site - and as we know- you cant defy the laws of nature - the debris at low level will show the wind direction - and the cake packing disks which blow out would have been very evident and on scene pictures would have established wind direction on day 1 - from what I saw, other than the railway track being too close, and unlike roads they are often empty for hours at a time and tend to be ignored from a debris point of view, trains not being as shiny and swervy as cars, I dont think the site unsuitable.

 

Guess we have to wait for the evidence to be produced - maybe the wind was blowing that way - funny it took 2 years to calculate it though.

[ramdram]

Interest thread this: And will be even more interesting to see if the "precedent being set issue" will migrate into other inustries, ie, farming/land management say.

 

Yesterday found me driving along the relatively new bypass part of the A38 (around Dobwalls, Cornwall) and noticing a farmer (either "him" or the Highways Agency?) burning off some damp greenery just by the side of the carriageway. Dense white smoke directly above the fire and the wind carrying the smoke and particles for about a hundred metres or so down the banking and along the carriageway "down" the hill. Nobody seen anywhere near the fire. Were there police about taking snaps?

 

Plus none of this smoke "rising" with the heat, the ambient atmos' was damp amd cool so once away from the rising heat it just dropped. and the wind took it.

 

Strikes me that farmers do cause a huge amount of air pollution what with burning off stubble, and ditto eco warriors "managing" heathlands/moorlands by burning off the gorse, whin or furze. We read of "controlled" burning but what about controlling the smoke?

 

We read too about the enormous power agriculture has in lobbying HMG so perhaps they have established the precedent that certain methods of land management can and does produce air pollution.

 

Should that be the case then it seems a tad unfair to prosecute the "fireworks man" for his smoke. If I was him I would be trying to establish instances where "farming/land mangement" caused similar problems and whether or not these bods were prosecuted for any consequent accidents, or sued by the car insurers.

[Brian]

... burning off stubble...

It's illegal to burn stubble except in a very limited number of circumstances.

[kerry davies]

Cornwall Council website says;

Finally, under the Highways Act 1980, anyone lighting a fire and allowing smoke to drift across a road faces a fine if it endangers traffic. Contact the police if this is the case.

Off you go Ram, dob the bu66ers in.

 

As to the Taunton case, the firer originally claimed the firing site was 500/600m from the Mway which would have placed him smack dab in the housing estate opposite, the field is less than 400m long. He also said he could not see the audience which, according to where he claimed the firing site was, were no more than 70 metres away, one pitch width.

 

The jack-knifed trucks which ran into the back end of the original collision are within 120m of the corner of the field and the claimed firing site is 150m from that. The police and fire officers, however were inspecting another area of the field the morning after and taking measurements around 30 to 50m from the carriageway, so we shall see what we shall see.

 

Of cases brought by the CPS that go through a full trial process they win more than 90%. They do not bring charges unless they are convinced they will convict.