WELLAND, Ont. – After pleading guilty to failure to provide information, instruction and supervision on safe work practices to an employee, the City of Welland has been ordered to pay a fine of $150,000 plus a victim fine surcharge. The sentence resulted from an incident on Dec. 9, 2013, when a City worker had been critically injured while helping to correct a sewer backup, according to a court bulletin from the Ontario Ministry of Labour (MOL). During the task, the employee was struck by a pressure hose that caused multiple puncture wounds on the worker’s body. Treatment at a hospital revealed that the worker had also contracted an infection from the puncture wounds. Despite apparent improvement in the worker’s condition following surgery and antibiotic treatment, the worker died on Dec. 26 of that year. A subsequent MOL investigation found that the workplace had no mandatory written policies or procedures ordering workers not to activate a rodding system when they cannot see the lateral sewer pipe; in addition, workers were unfamiliar with the manual of the Vactor truck involved in the incident and had not operated the jetting nozzle properly or safely. On Dec. 16 of this year, Judge Moira A. Moses handed down the fine at the Ontario Court of Justice in Welland.