The owner of a Terrace Bay pulp and paper mill has been fined for violating Ontario’s occupational health and safety rules over a 2019 incident in which a worker became caught in a pulp machine.
Ontario’s Ministry of labour, training and skills development imposed an $80,000 fine and a 25 per cent victim surcharge on AV Terrace Bay Inc., the New Brunswick-based company that operates the mill.
The conviction was handed down on Sept. 27 by Justice of the Peace Bernard Caron following a guilty plea from the company. The incident itself took place on June 25, 2019.
According to a release from the province, a worker at the mill was in the process of pulling a sheet of pulp and attempting to place it between two rotating “nip rolls” they became caught in the rolls.
A co-worker was able to activate the emergency stop, freeing the worker, who sustained injuries.
Caron found the company’s failure to equip the pulp machine with a guard or other device preventing access to the pinch point was contrary to the Occupational Health and Safety Act and other provincial industrial regulations.
