The Health and Safety Authority (HSA) has begun an investigation after a customer in his 50s was killed when fencing fell on top of him from a top shelf storage area at a retail store in Dublin yesterday afternoon.
A member of staff also narrowly escaped injury in the incident which occurred at the home improvement and DIY store B&Q in Tallaght at about 2.30 pm.
The store, which is one of nine shops operated by the retail chain in the Republic, remains closed following the accident.
A spokesman for the Health and Safety Authority said it had been informed of the incident and had begun an investigation into the circumstances behind it.
In a statement, the director of B&Q Ireland Brian Mooney, expressed his condolences to the victim's family.
“It is with great sadness we confirm there was a fatal accident at our store in Tallaght yesterday, Sunday 29th March 2009. The store team are all devastated and our thoughts are with the friends and family of the deceased," said Mr Mooney
"We are working side by side with the HSA and Garda Siochāna on a thorough investigation to understand how this tragic accident happened and our store will remain closed whilst this is underway," he added.
B&Q is Europe's largest home improvement and garden centre retailer with more than 330 stores and 40,000 employees
The chain has been in Ireland since March 2002, when it opened a large warehouse store at the Liffey Valley centre, west Dublin. It opened its mini-warehouse store in Tallaght in October 2003.
Last year B&Q was fined almost £28,000 in fines and costs after a worker employed at one of its stores in the West Midlands in Britan was knocked unconscious when a lawnmower fell on her.
Meanwhile, In 2005, the company was fined £550,000 and ordered to pay £250,000 in costs after a 69-year-old woman died after being crushed by a forklift truck at a store in Dorset . A year earlier, the company was fined £10,000 when a door fell on a 63-year-old male customer's head at a store in Glasgow, Scotland.
