A 15-YEAR-OLD boy on a long-term work experience programme with a joinery company lost the tip of a finger when he stuck his hand into a high-power fan, a court heard.

Blackburn magistrates heard the incident happened in the "most exceptional and peculiar circumstances."

Five months later, Stewart Mason could still not offer an explanation for his behaviour.

H and S Joinery Limited, of Thwaites Close, Shadsworth Business Park, which provided him with a placement under the scheme run by East Lancashire Business Partnership and Trident Skills for Life, pleaded guilty to two offences under the Health and Safety at Work Act.

They were fined a total of £2,500 and ordered to pay £920 costs. Christopher Goodlad, prosecuting for the Health and Safety Executive, said Steven was in his final year at school when he secured a placement with the company in October. His work was restricted to simple joinery, not involving power tools.

He was seen standing near a power sanding machine and seconds later he was clutching his hand which was covered in blood.

Mr Goodlad said Steven had placed his hand into the exhaust pipe of a powerful fan used to provide suction to keep pieces of timber in place when they were being sanded.

He said Steven told investigators that he had put his hand into the fan to try to move it. But Mr Goodlad said that, apart from being far too heavy for one person to move, the fan was bolted to the floor.

He said all employers had a duty to prevent access to dangerous parts of machinery and the measures in place on the fan fell way short of the required standard.

He said there was a specific requirement to consider young people and take measures to protect them in view of their lack of experience and awareness of risk.

Rosalind Emsley-Smith, defending, said Stewart still worked for the company under the scheme and would become a full-time employee later this year.

She said that under the scheme a young persons' risk assessment had been carried out before he started work and a copy of this had been sent to his parents.

The placement had been offered as a way of putting something back into the community and also as a favour to Steven's brother who had worked with the managing director, Stephen Hudson, for 10 years.

She said Steven's work station was some 18m away from the sanding machine and there was no explanation as to why he had wandered to the back of the machine where the fan was located.