A truck driver had just finished loading an electrical enclosure onto his truck bed. He was standing about 51 inches above the ground. That is a little over four feet. He asked for a hand getting down.
What happened next is the whole case. Someone reached for the wrong tool, and a man died over a four-foot drop.
What Happened
On October 7, 2024, a truck driver arrived at Ralston Metal Products Limited, an electrical enclosure manufacturer at 50 Watson Road South in Guelph. The enclosure was loaded onto his truck. The driver climbed up onto the bed to secure the load, then asked for help getting back down.
A worker, Louie Soligo, brought over a Raymond order picker to assist. An order picker is mobile equipment built for one standing operator on a designed platform. It is not a personnel lift. It is not a set of stairs. It has one job, and carrying a passenger is not it.
The driver stepped from the truck onto the order picker's platform and into the fork area. Soligo turned to the controls and moved the machine. The driver fell to the ground and sustained fatal injuries.
A four-foot problem was solved with a machine that made it a fatal one.
What the Law Says
Ralston Metal was charged under section 54(1)(c) of Ontario Regulation 851 (Industrial Establishments) and section 25(1)(c) of the OHSA. The worker, Louie Soligo, was charged under section 28(1)(a) of the OHSA.
Section 54(1)(c) says mobile equipment shall only be used to transport a person other than the operator when that person is in a seat that is permanently installed for that purpose. Section 25(1)(c) puts the duty on the employer to ensure the prescribed measures are carried out. Section 28(1)(a) puts a duty on the worker to work in compliance with the Act and its regulations.
Basically, what this means is simple: an order picker is for the operator, standing where the machine was designed for them to stand. It is not a ride. If a person has no permanently installed seat on that machine, that person does not travel on it. Full stop. The employer has to make sure that rule holds. And the worker has a legal duty to follow it too.
Ralston Metal was convicted on June 11, 2026. The company was fined $175,000 and Soligo was fined $20,000, for a total of $195,000, plus the 25 percent victim fine surcharge on each. This is one of the rare cases where a worker was fined alongside the employer. The law reached both the company that let the practice exist and the individual whose hands were on the controls.
Three Things This Case Teaches Ontario Employers
- A machine's design is the rule, not a suggestion. An order picker, a forklift, a telehandler, a skid steer. Each is built for a defined job with a defined operator position. The moment you use one to lift, ride, or carry a person it was not designed to carry, you have left the manufacturer's limits and the law behind. Match the task to equipment built for it.
- The small drops kill people because nobody plans for them. Four feet feels like nothing, so no one grabs a step platform or a proper ladder. Provide safe, obvious means to get on and off truck beds and loading areas. If drivers routinely climb your trucks on your site, that access is your responsibility to plan.
- Your workers carry their own legal duty, so train them to it. Soligo was fined because a worker's obligation to comply is real. That is not a reason to blame the front line. It is a reason to train every worker on what mobile equipment can and cannot do, and to make refusing an unsafe workaround the expected response, not the brave one.
Walk your yard tomorrow and watch how people get down from trucks, mezzanines, and loading docks. If the answer is "whatever is closest," you have this case waiting to happen. Ask your team one question: when someone needs to get down from a height, what is the approved way, and is it within arm's reach right now. If they hesitate, you already have your action item.