Skyladder Construction was constructing a single-storey extension with a flat roof at a domestic property in Farnborough. On the evening of 20th July 2022, it began to rain, and a director and an employee returned to the site at approximately 11pm to cover the new roof with a blue plastic tarpaulin, securing it with logs of wood.
At some point, Bhakta Rai went onto the roof to assist and fell through a hole intended for a skylight, falling approximately 2.5 metres onto the concrete floor below.
In an attempt to recover Mr Rai, he was lifted back through the roof opening, carried across the roof, and then brought down a ladder at the front of the property. No ambulance was called, and Mr Rai was transported to hospital in a van.
He died a few days later after sustaining significant injuries, including a spinal fracture, fractured skull, possible bleed on the brain and swelling to the head.
The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) attended the scene on 21st July 2022. Between the police leaving the site (at around 4am) and the HSE鈥檚 arrival later that day, the tarpaulin had been replaced, covering the roof.
An HSE investigation found that Skyladder Construction Limited had failed to take suitable and sufficient measures to prevent, so far as was reasonably practicable, any person from falling a distance liable to cause personal injury. There were no physical measures in place at the edges of the building or around the skylight openings to prevent a fall, and no measures to mitigate the distance or impact of a fall.
Skyladder Construction also contravened a requirement imposed by an HSE inspector. During the investigation, HSE requested information from the company under Section 20 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, which it is an offence not to provide. No response was received.
HSE guidance sets out measures for planning and carrying out work at height safely. It includes practical controls that can be implemented to remove or reduce the risk of a fall. Following this guidance would have identified the risks from the unprotected roof and shown that the risk could have been eliminated entirely by changing how the work was undertaken.
Farnborough-based Skyladder Construction Limited聽was fined 拢33,500, ordered to pay 拢8,472 in costs, and a 拢2,000 victim surcharge at Basingstoke Magistrates鈥� Court on 31st October 2025.
HSE inspector Jenny Morris said after the hearing: 鈥淔alls when working at height remain the most common kind of workplace fatality, accounting for around a quarter of all worker deaths. In this case, this was a wholly avoidable incident 鈥� Mr Rai died in a fall which should never have been able to happen.鈥�
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