A plasterer's son watched in horror as his father fell head-first from scaffolding on a Co Roscommon building site, an inquest heard today.
Shane Gibbons said he spotted his father Colm, from Ballinafad, Strokestown, Co Roscommon, fall as he plastered the outside of a bungalow.
Mr Gibbons, who worked with his father, told the Dublin City Coroner's Court: "Out of the corner of my eye I saw my father fall from the scaffolding." The victim's son said he had earlier noticed the scaffolding swaying.
"It didn't collapse but it was swaying," he said, adding that the owner of the house had erected the scaffolding and was not qualified to do so.
An inspector from the Health and Safety Authority (HSA), PJ Murphy, said it was not certain how the 48-year-old had fallen from the scaffolding on August 10th, 2004 at the house at Corradrehid, Four-Mile-House, in the county.
But he said: "If scaffolding is unstable it is reasonable on the balance of probability one may fall."
Walter Gibbons, a brother of the deceased, said the scaffolding had not stretched the full width of the wall the father-of-three was plastering. He said Mr Gibbons had told him from his hospital bed that he had reached out to plaster the corner of the house and had fallen.
Sgt Declan Hunt from Roscommon station said gardai travelled to the site a few days later after being made aware of the death. He displayed photographs of scaffolding in front of the house.
But the family said the scaffolding had been changed before the garda photographs were taken.
Sgt Hunt said: "It is quite possible the scaffolding could have been changed, it was a few days after." He told the inquest there was nothing suspicious in the death.
The HSA inspector said when he travelled to view the site the scaffolding was not in place.
Dublin City Coroner, Dr Brian Farrell, said he would place a family photograph of the original scaffolding on the record.
The jury passed a verdict of accidental death due to a fall from scaffolding.
PA