Focus Four Hazards: Caught-In or Caught-Between
What counts as caught-in or caught-between
This Focus Four category covers injuries in which a person is squeezed, crushed, or drawn into a mechanism or a narrow space. The four common patterns are cave-ins of trenches and excavations, being pulled into rotating or moving machinery, being crushed between a piece of equipment and a fixed object, and being caught under or between materials and equipment.
Controls
Trench work requires a protective system at 5 feet, daily competent-person inspections, spoils and equipment set back at least 2 feet from the edge, and a ladder within 25 feet of lateral travel. Machinery requires guarding at the point of operation, lockout/tagout before servicing or maintenance, no loose clothing or jewelry near rotating parts, and barricades around moving equipment. Operators must keep pedestrians out of pinch zones, and a spotter should never stand between a backing vehicle and a fixed object.
Traps
Classification questions are the main trap. A worker standing in a trench when the wall collapses is a caught-in (cave-in) fatality, not struck-by. A worker who falls into an unguarded hole is a fall; a worker who falls into a running mixer is caught-in. Crushing between two objects still counts even if only one of them is powered.
Rule of thumb: if the mechanism involves converging surfaces or a machine that grabs, answer caught-in/between; if the person is hit and knocked away, answer struck-by.