Waiariki Institute of Technology has been ordered to pay $40,000 to a tutor after he was seriously injured during a forest operations course.

The Bay of Plenty tertiary education provider was sentenced in the Rotorua District Court this week under the Health and Safety in Employment Act for two failures.

Firstly, for failing to take all practicable steps to ensure the safety of its employee while at work, and secondly, for failing to take all practicable steps to ensure that no action or inaction of any employee while at work harmed any other person.

The tutor's injuries were extensive – fractures to the right shoulder, the lower back, a leg and five ribs. He also had severe abdominal pain and swelling, a collapse in both lungs and bruised vertebrae.

He has needed ongoing physiotherapy and further surgery is likely. He is unable to work.

The tutor – who had not taught a tertiary course before - was employed to teach the basic pre-trade programme where students are primarily taught how to operate a chainsaw. Tree felling is not part of this course.

Students usually take the course before starting a forestry apprenticeship.

On August 26, 2014, the students had completed the six week theory part of the course and were in their third week of the practical section. The firewood yard where lessons were usually taught had run out of wood, so the lesson was held on a Marlborough farm.

The tutor discussed the hazards of the lesson with the students and filled out a hazard identification and assessment form.

The students were told to stand near a van while the tutor manually felled the two trees. After that the students trimmed and cut the felled trees.

The tutor decided to fell a third tree which was 24 metres high, on a significant lean and with a large branch jutting out the back.

The students were standing closer to the tree than they should have been – the tutor was aware of this.

The tutor asked one of the students to 'spot” for him while he made a cut in the tree. The tutor then inadvertently cut the ‘hingewood' of the tree and when the final cut was made, the tree fell in an unintended direction, crushing him.

WorkSafe New Zealand's investigation identified a number of health and safety breaches.

'Waiariki Institute of Technology should have assessed the tutor's competence in tree felling before he taught any classes,” says WorkSafe's central region chief inspector of assessments Jo Pugh.

'They also should have provided a written process for tutors on how to source wood safely and on when tree felling could occur.

'But this serious incident could have been avoided if simple safety steps had been in place in the first instance,” adds Jo.

Waiariki Institute of Technology has reviewed its policies since the incident, sent all tutors a copy of the best practice guidelines for tree felling and had tutors attend a refresher course on tree felling.

As Waiariki Institute of Technology is a Crown organisation it cannot be fined due to the Crown Organisations (Criminal Liability) Act but the Court can still order reparation.