Firm fined €1.8m over Ford’s ‘Star Wars’ set injury

A film production company has been fined £1.6m (€1.8m) for health and safety breaches after Harrison Ford was crushed by a hydraulic door on the set of the Millennium Falcon spaceship while filming a ‘Star Wars’ movie.

Foodles Production (UK) Ltd was handed the penalty at Aylesbury Crown Court yesterday after the Disney-owned company admitted two breaches of health and safety law following the incident, in which Ford was knocked to the ground and pinned down by the steel door.

The actor was reprising his role as Han Solo in Star Wars: The Force Awakens at Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire in June 2014 when he was hit by the door, which had been designed to mimic the action of a door on the original set.

At a previous hearing, the court was told he could have been killed in the incident.

The British Health and Safety Executive said the power of the rapidly-closing door meant Ford was hit with a force comparable to the weight of a small car.

Judge Francis Sheridan said the firm had failed to communicate its risk assessment to Ford. He said: “The greatest failing of all on behalf of the company is a lack of communication, a lack because, if you have a risk assessment and you do not communicate it, what is the point of having one? That is the most serious breach here. If only they had included Mr Ford in all the discussions, he might have at least been alert to the dangers that he had to avoid.”

Earlier, prosecutor Andrew Marshall said Ford had gone through the door on the set with another actor and hit a button during a second dress rehearsal.

He started to walk back through the door, believing the set was not live and that it would not close because it had not done so during previous rehearsals.

The 1.2m by 2m door was designed to be remotely closed by a special effects operator, who shut it upon a signal from a spotter.

It acted like a “blunt guillotine”, coming down “millimetres from his face” as he passed underneath and pinning him by the pelvis to the ground.

The actor talked about the incidenton The Jonathan Ross Show, saying that in the original film a door would have been closed with a pulley and a stage hand, adding: “But now we had lots of money and technology and so they built a fucking great hydraulic door which closed at light speed.”