‘Our hearts were broken:’ Family mourns son killed in workplace accident
CALGARY — The grieving father of a young man who died in a workplace accident in Alberta’s oilsands region interrupted a courtroom apology Friday from one of the owners of a company that pleaded guilty in the death.
Jordan Gahan, who was 21 and from Fredericton, was operating heavy equipment at a Suncor pit that was being reclaimed near Fort McMurray when his excavator fell through ice into four metres of water. His co-workers were able to get him to the surface, but he died in hospital.
Brayford Trucking Ltd. pleaded guilty to two of five charges under Alberta’s Occupational Health and Safety Act for failing to protect Gahan as an employee.
“There’s no words or actions or anything that can possibly express to you how sorry we are and you no longer have your son. We can’t even begin to imagine the pain and suffering that’s associated with losing a child,” co-owner Susan Brayford said in a statement to the court Friday.