There were 23 fatalities worldwide involving mobile elevating work platforms (MEWPs) - also known as aerial work platforms (AWPs) - in the first half of 2014, according to findings from IPAF's accident database.

While that appears to suggest an improvement on last year (53 fatalities in 12 months), the industry group cautions against comparisons.

The main causes of these fatalities in 2014 have been: overturn (9), fall from height (8), entrapment (3), electrocution (2), and technical/mechanical (1).

Eleven of the fatalities involved mobile booms and 10 involved static booms. In two cases, the machine type is as yet unconfirmed.

Of these fatalities, 13 occurred in the USA, two in Germany, and one each in Australia, Austria, Columbia, Malaysia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain and the UK.

"More companies are participating in the accident reporting project, which is generating more data in its third year, but it is too early to draw comparisons," says Chris Wraith, IPAF technical & safety executive. "This is a unique ground-breaking program by the powered access industry to undertake ongoing analysis to learn lessons and improve safety worldwide. Preliminary findings from the accident reporting project have provided a rich source for improving IPAF's training program and safety initiatives, for example, with regards to the safe loading and unloading of machines, and managing electrocution risks when working near power lines."

Putting the fatalities into perspective, IPAF CEO Tim Whiteman notes that there are over one million rental units worldwide and concludes that "MEWPs are one of the safest ways to do temporary work at height".

IPAF's accident reporting project was launched in January 2012 and has filled a gap where there was previously no single mechanism for reporting and analysing serious accidents involving MEWPs/AWPs and no definitive data on the number and main causes of fatal accidents. In the first year of the project, 32 fatalities worldwide involving MEWPs/AWPs were reported.