Industrial accident attorney, what is a severe accident?

Hello. This is the industrial accident attorney at Daeryun Law Firm (LLC). You asked about severe accidents.

A severe accident refers to cases where the disaster, such as an employee's death, is serious among industrial accidents.

According to the Act on Punishment of Severe Accidents enforced from 2022, severe accidents that occurred during work are specified as follows.

① When 1 or more deaths occur

② When 2 or more injured persons requiring 6 months or more of treatment occur from the same accident

③ When 3 or more occupational disease patients such as acute poisoning occur within 1 year due to the same harmful factor

Business owners must take measures to prevent such severe accidents and prevent recurrence.

First, you must secure necessary personnel and budget for accident prevention and establish a safety and health management system.

If an accident occurs, you must establish recurrence prevention measures and take immediate action.

Also, if there are matters that have come down from the state for improvement or correction, these must be implemented.

If a severe accident occurs because such measures were not taken, the business owner may be punished.

As in case ① above, when a death occurs, imprisonment for 1 year or more or a fine of up to 1 billion won is imposed.

Also, if it falls under reasons ② or ③, imprisonment of up to 7 years or a fine of up to 100 million won may be imposed.

Therefore, it is important to thoroughly establish measures to prevent severe accidents from occurring.

To respond to such severe accidents, we recommend obtaining legal advice from an industrial accident attorney to prepare.