5,000-pound drum crushes 63-year-old worker to death at Minnesota plant, cops say
An employee at a Minnesota manufacturing plant is dead after a cement mixing drum fell on top of him, officials told news outlets.
It happened in the morning Monday, April 29, at Con-Tech Manufacturing in Dodge Center, the Dodge County Sheriff’s Department told the Brainerd Dispatch.
McClatchy News reached out to Con-Tech for comment on April 30 but did not immediately receive a response.
The worker, 63-year-old Teofolio Gonzalez, was “cutting a cross beam support” on a dolly that was being used to support the cement mixer, the newspaper reported.
However, officials say the dolly collapsed under the 5,000-pound drum, which then crushed Gonzalez, KIMT reported.
Coworkers used forklifts to lift the drum off the man, deputies told the station.
Once the drum was cleared away, workers performed CPR on Gonzalez until first responders arrived, KAAL reported. Gonzalez was pronounced dead at 10:29 a.m. — about half an hour after an ambulance was requested.
Investigators with the state Occupational Safety and Health Administration arrived at the site on April 30, a Department of Labor spokesperson told McClatchy News in an email.
“We will inspect work areas for safety or health hazards, try to determine what caused or contributed to the accidents and review whether existing OSHA standards were violated,” they said. “The case is open and ongoing so there is no public information currently.”
Dodge Center is a roughly 80-mile drive southeast from Minneapolis.
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