HSE warning over gas brooders

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has warned producers to ensure that adequate ventilation is in place in sheds using gas fired brooder heaters, after a man died of carbon monoxide poisoning in Scotland.

Lindsay George Redpath, a part-time beater, died aged 37 when sleeping overnight in a pheasant-rearing shed at Balbirnie Estates, Fife in 2006.

The HSE inspector who led the investigation into his death, Lawrence Murray, said: “Even though the heater was found to be in good working order a phenomenon known as atmospheric vitiation resulted in incomplete combustion of the fuel gas, leading to the production of high levels of CO as Mr Redpath slept.”

Mr Murray added that headaches were often an early sign of exposure to carbon monoxide.