JUNE 10, 2015
Washington state officials are investigating after a
52-year-old Whatcom County man working with a friend on a demolition job was
fatally crushed beneath a steel beam.
BLAINE, WASHINGTON
Washington state officials are investigating after a
52-year-old Whatcom County man working with a friend on a demolition job was
fatally crushed beneath a steel beam.
The Bellingham Herald reports that James Loyd Bost was
helping to scrap a cyclone air separator on Monday. The 30-foot-tall piece of
machinery is an industrial-sized filter for dust and other small particles in
the air. The newspaper says four steel beams formed a square to support it.
Police say two beams buckled under the separator and knocked
the other two outward. One of the beams fell onto Bost. The county medical
examiner says the man died at the scene from asphyxia.
State Department of Labor and Industries investigators are
trying to determine what went wrong.