A worker died after being crushed by a ton of recyclable paper at a Northeast Philadelphia recycling site Tuesday morning.
The 42-year-old man was performing a routine inspection of his forklift at Waste Management's Philadelphia Material Recovery Facility along Bleigh Avenue near the Delaware River around 7:30 a.m. The forklift was situated near large bales of tightly packed recyclable paper, each bale weighing around one ton(2000 pounds).
Another person was operating a forklift nearby when it struck a group of cardboard, causing a cascade effect which led to one of the bales toppling onto the 42-year-old man, police said. The victim was taken to Aria-Torresdale Hospital where he was pronounced dead at 8:24 a.m.
NBC10 has a call into Waste Management for comment.
Both OSHA and police continue to investigate the incident. Officials have not yet released the victim's identity.
