Woodbury Legal Blog

Workers in the Minnesota area might not realize it, but it is actually fairly likely that, on a given day, they will either get hurt at work themselves or may witness a significant workplace accident. According to an analysis by the National Safety Council, someone in this country gets hurt at work at an average rate of 7 seconds. The Council arrived at this number by dividing the approximately 4.5 million work-related injuries that happen annually.

Many of these accidents are more than just minor cuts or scrapes that can be treated at the scene. In fact, the Safety Council estimated that, as of 2016, workers were missing 104 million days of work annually due to various injuries. The most common types of injuries that kept people away from work included bad cuts and scrapes, generalized pain and sprains and the like.

When a worker gets hurt in a construction accident, it may be hard for that worker, or the family, to know to whom to turn in order to get compensation. In theory, the construction worker's own employer should have worker's compensation available to cover the injured worker's medical bills and lost wages.

Unfortunately, though, some construction outfits choose to ignore this law. In other cases, a worker may find he or she is without benefits because of an honest mistake or a misunderstanding of Minnesota law.

A man from the northern part of our state, who gave of his time to coach lacrosse and referee soccer games for a nearby school system, has suffered critical injuries because of a work-related accident. As of the latest report, the man was able to breathe with the help of a machine, but was comatose, suggesting he may have suffered a severe brain injury.

Initial reports were that the man fell about 20 feet from a conveyor. He was working at a lumberyard at the time of the accident, and rescuers transported him to a hospital in Duluth.

As anyone in the Minneapolis and Saint Paul area who has worked construction knows, there are many ways to get hurt while on a construction site doing work. For instance, oftentimes, construction zones involving scaling scaffolding to great heights or working below ground in a deep trench. Objects can fall, trenches can collapse and a worker can herself lose balance and take a tumble from a great height. Sometimes, the problem lies with a defective or dangerous tool or machine, while at other times equipment collapses, causing falls and other serious injuries.

One must also not forget that construction zones, particularly along a highway, are crowded with cars and other motor vehicles and drivers can of course get in to accidents. Even white collar workers who are employed by construction firms are not immune from a job-related car accident or even a fall or other injury.