Worker Buried Alive At Milpitas Construction Site
MILPITAS (CBS / AP) -- California workplace safety regulators are investigating a fatal construction accident in which a 37-year-old carpenter was buried and crushed when a hillside collapsed.
The San Jose Mercury News reported that Milpitas inspectors had ordered work at the construction site, a gated community where a crew was building a 5,800-square-foot house, halted three days before the accident Saturday.
The city had determined that recent rains and an absence of shoring in the foundation hole had made the site unsafe, but the contractor, Fremont-based U.S.-Sino Investment, did not comply with the stop-work order, the newspaper said.
A Cal/OSHA spokeswoman said the carpenter was working in a 12-foot-deep ditch when it caved in. As of Monday evening, he still had not been identified because public safety workers had not been able to safely remove his body.
(Copyright 2012 by CBS San Francisco. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
