Irish Ferries fined €125k after crane driver’s death

Irish Ferries has been fined €125,000 for failing to have designated pedestrian walkways at a Dublin Port cargo area where a crane driver was crushed to death.

Stephen Bayfield, 47, who worked for an outsourced company, died over three years ago when he was struck by the tyre of a crane he was due to operate as he returned from a lunch break.

Company representative Paul Sullivan pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on behalf of Irish Ferries Ltd, of B & I Ferryport, Alexandra Rd, Dublin 1, to the charge that it failed to provide designated walkways in the cargo handling area on October 28, 2011. The company has no previous convictions.

Padraic McMahon, an inspector with the Health and Safety Authority, revealed that Irish Ferries has since fulfilled requirements for designated walkways.

He told Fionnuala O’Sullivan, prosecuting, that he was called to the scene at Dublin Port where a rubber tyre from a 90m-tall crane had crushed Mr Bayfield.

He said Mr Bayfield worked for Scruttons Northern Ireland Ltd, which had been outsourced by Irish Ferries and was responsible for day-to-day management of the site and its employees.

The deceased’s wife, Julie Bayfield, said her “world fell apart” the day of the incident. She described the pain of not being able to see her husband’s body and having to identify him from his watch and phone.

“The hardest thing is that I never got to say goodbye... If I could have only seen a part of Stephen, it would have helped,” Ms Bayfield said.

“They say time is a great healer, but when a heart is broken it never heals.”

Judge Martin Nolan extended his condolences to the Bayfield family, but said the only sentence option open to him was a fine.

He took into account that Irish Ferries had pleaded guilty, fully co-operated, and apologised to the family. He gave the firm two months to pay the fine.