Australian logistics company Arrow Worldwide has been charged with seven offences after a truck driver was seriously injured at a Melbourne freight depot in May, 2021.

Steel beams weighing approximately 1.5 T fell onto a 64-year-old truck driver as freight was being loaded onto his truck with a forklift, the Victorian state government regulator WorkSafe says in a statement.

“It's alleged Arrow Worldwide failed to provide or maintain a safe system of work for loading freight onto vehicles using a forklift; failed to provide instructions to transport drivers; and failed to implement a traffic management plan to reduce the risk of mobile plant colliding with pedestrians,” the statement says.

Arrow Worldwide is facing three charges under section 23(1) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act for failing to ensure persons other than employees were not exposed to health and safety risks.

The company is also facing four charges under section 26(1) of the OHS Act for failing to ensure that a workplace under its management and control was, so far as was reasonably practicable, safe and without risks to health.

The matter is listed for a filing hearing at Melbourne Magistrates' Court on 31 May 2023.