Forklift Workplace Tragedy - Donna Van Bruggen - Threads of Life

Donna Van Bruggen’s son David was tragically killed while refueling a forklift on his lunch break in 2012. Donna is a speaker with Threads of Life and shares David’s story to emphasize how vital it is to remain aware of surroundings and alert to hazards in the workplace.

Transcript

 Perley Brewer   0:12
 Welcome to today's podcast.
 My name is Pearlie Brewer and I will be your host.
 Today's podcast guest is Donovan Bergen.
 Donna lost her son, David, and a forklift.
 Workplace fatality we try as much as we can every month to share at least one story of someone who has been affected by a workplace accident, fatality injury and it's it's a reminder that no matter who you are as a listener who your employees are, it can happen to you and and we want to continue remind people that in fact it does happen.
 Unfortunately, on an ongoing basis, so today we have Donna to share her story with us and and we'd like to thank you, Donna for taking the time and it can never be easy for you to to Share your story.
Donna Van Bruggen   1:02
 It it it is an emotional time, yes.
Perley Brewer   1:05
 So Donna, let's start by getting you to tell us about your son David.
Donna Van Bruggen   1:11
 Sure.
 I'll start right from the very beginning.
 When I was in my mid teens, I knew that one day I would have a son and his name would be David and I had to wait a while for that to happen.
 I mean, there was school finish marriage and two beautiful daughters to come first, but finally on a particular April 20th, David arrived and I was able to hold him in my arms for the very first time.
 Now about the first thing I noticed about my new4 son was how big is hands were.
 And the second thing I noticed about my newborn son was how big is feet were?
 And when I saw the size of his feet, I thought I'm gonna have a hard time finding shoes that fit him.
Perley Brewer   1:55
 And.
Donna Van Bruggen   2:02
 Which did prove to be the case as he was growing and when I saw that size of his hands, I thought that boy is going to grow up to help and serve other people.
 And and I was right about that.
 There's something special about David, even from the time he was very little, he loved helping people.
 For instance, when he was three and his older sister got stuck in some mud in our backyard where we hadn't finished the landscaping.
 And David didn't hesitate to dawn his coat.
 And when David was three years old, his career of choice was to be Superman, and I firmly supported him in that career choice because being Superman is a wonderful helping profession, and I really think David thought he just why across the mud and get his sister out.
 But it didn't work that way.
 He ended up getting stuck too, so I had to get both of them out of the mud, but not before I went inside the house and got a camera to take a picture.
 They were not impressed with me and so was just a little acts of service when David was six, he became an entrepreneur and started a fly swatting business.
 That summer we had lots of flies in our neighborhood.
 It was just a year for flies.
 I think the conditions were just right and David printed out, you know, hand printed some business cards and sent them around the neighborhood.
 And actually I want to just read off what was he put on the business card, he says exterminator.
 Call 352-4081.
 Call me.
 It's cheap.
 Kill flies.
Perley Brewer   3:51
 And.
Donna Van Bruggen   3:54
 And so they said we had lots of flies and they kept trying to come into people's houses.
 We had a nice little business.
 He was armed with a fly swatter, and he swatted his way around the neighborhood.
 But why would he become an exterminator?
 And an entrepreneur at the age of 6, it was because he wanted to earn enough money to Take Me Out for supper.
 See, my marriage didn't last, and at that time I was a single parent raising three kids on my own, working full time.
 And on a very tight budget and we didn't have money to do things like go out to eat.
 So David decided that he would earn the money, and he even printed a card at school on a computer.
 And he said on the card.
 I promise to take you out to a restaurant.
 I'll pay David and he made good on that promise.
 Now when you're 6, David's idea of fine dining was McDonald's.
 But I didn't mind cause he told me I could have whatever I wanted, even dessert.
 And so as he got older, he kept trying to help people as much as he could.
 And one day.
 Another single parent mom and her four year old son, Brandon, moved into our neighborhood and Brandon.
 He was a lonely little guy and he was shy, so he just didn't know anybody.
 And David took him under his wing.
 And when Brandon started kindergarten, his class was planning a father and child party.
 You know, at that time Brandon's biological father was not part of his life.
 So Brandon, that David, if he would be his dad and take him to the party.
 And they went and they had an actually wonderful time together.
 And David, what is 12 years old when Brandon asked him to be his father?
 So just reaffirmed to me the David was destined to make a positive difference in the lives of a lot of people.
 Not because he's going to be rich or famous.
 This David didn't seek out to those things, it was because he had a heart full of love and he loved helping people.
 And as a young adult, he devoted 2 years of his life to go to another country and serve there.
 And when he came back, his heart's desire was to find his soulmate, get married, and start a family of his own.
 And he met and married a wonderful young lady.
 And a few years later, they were expecting their first child.
 And I was privileged to be there at the birth and the look of love on David's face as he held his newborn son in his arms that look of love.
 It's almost beyond description.
 And that's still I have a photo of that, and it's one of my favorite photos of David holding his newborn son.
 And they wanted a big family, so eventually they welcomed three other children, so they had four in total.
 And we were all all living in central Alberta and one day.
 David and his wife realized a dream of theirs.
 They wanted to move from the Big city.
 They were in and in central Alberta and Edmonton to a more rural area in southern Alberta.
 Is they wanted to have more time together as a family.
 It was someplace.
 It was more laid back than the Russian hubbub of the city, and so eventually that dream came true.
 And they were able to move there.
 And.
 So they had so much to look forward to.
 It was hard for me to see them go cause then I couldn't just phone up and say, hey, come for supper tonight.
Perley Brewer   8:22
 Hmm.
Donna Van Bruggen   8:23
 They were gone.
 And then one day.
 Everything changed.
 On October 17th, 2012.
 David went to work.
 And he did not come home.
 His wife.
 Told me and said David had been struck by a forklift and killed instantly.
 And that was the day that.
 A heart full of love was forever stilled.
 When they first heard the words David and dead used in the same sentence.
 I I went into shock.
 And I could hardly breathe, and I felt like the ground fell out from under me, and I barely remember toning some friends, and I don't even know how long it was before they came over.
 And I couldn't even form my thoughts clearly and and because I couldn't think clearly, I knew it would not be safe for me to drive from central Alberta to southern Alberta that night.
 Still, after many hours of staring in the dark.
 The next day.
 I started on my journey.
 Which was actually the most arduous journey of my life.
 The journey to bury my beloved son David.
 And that was that journey was marked by.
 Maybe keeping me like I kept looking at the clock in my car.
 I was acutely aware of the time.
 And myself, talk went something like this.
 It's 9:30 AM.
 24 hours ago that this time David was still alive.
 It's 11 AM, 24 hours ago at this time, David was still alive and this went on until.
 It was at 12:45 PM and then my this thought came into my mind.
 It's 12:45 PM.
 24 hours ago at this time.
 David was in the last 15 minutes of his life.
 And he didn't even know it.
 Now as soon as I finish thinking and he didn't even know it.
 I experienced what I can only describe as like maybe the world's worst panic attack.
 And my heart rate just bumped up all of a sudden and I was gasping for breath.
 And it was so bad.
 I had to pull over on the highway and have the car at the edge because.
 I just couldn't control it.
 And they had this almost overwhelming urge to get out of the car and run screaming in terror down the highway.
 You see, David was killed sometime around 1:00 PM.
 But he wasn't found by his coworkers until close to 1:30 PM, and that was due to some unusual circumstances.
 So until that period of time until 130 passed on my clock.
 I just sat in my car and sobbed and I couldn't continue on with stuff.
 My trip to southern Alberta.
 Keep bringing your body do peculiar things when you're under intense emotional distress.
 Let's take a breather here for a couple of breaths.
Perley Brewer   13:24
 Take your time.
Donna Van Bruggen   13:49
 Listen.
 Which would you like me to do address next?
 Or is is her topic.
Perley Brewer   14:00
 No, just continue on with your story.
Donna Van Bruggen   14:01
 I'll just continue on, OK.
 Will.
 Never know.
 Exactly what happened to David?
 There were no witnesses.
 The only person that could provide any details was killed.
 However, we do know a few facts.
 That.
 David was refueling a forklift on his lunch break and because he was on his lunch break, people thought his coworkers thought he was off site and they didn't look for him until his lunch break finished and he didn't come back.
 A lot of things we don't really know for sure, but the occupational health and safety investigators think this is probably the most likely scenario.
 The the fuel shed was way in the back of the lot.
 Everybody else was in the building.
 You couldn't see out the back because there's no windows out the back to see the fuel shed actually had to count go out of the building.
 In order to see it.
 And what the OHSU investigators think happened and don't know for sure.
 But this is what they think happened is David had parked the forklift close to the fuel shed.
 It was facing the fuel shed.
 The break was not set and then he put the gas nozzle into the gas tank of the forklift and started filling edge and a certain point.
 He wanted to check to see how full it gets.
 Tank was getting so he leaned over the front, put the key in the ignition.
 And turned it. He didn't.
 His intent was not to turn it all the way.
 It was.
 Turn it part way, just so the dash lights would come on.
 Similar to our vehicles, we can put the key in and turn out partway.
 The dash lights come on and you can see if the gas tank is full, but the motor doesn't start.
 But that day, David turned to key too far, with the forklift started.
 So it was obviously in gear two and the break was not set in.
 It lurched forward and one of the up straight struts struck David right in the heart.
 Now, if that's all that happened that day, he would have been knocked to the ground and injured, most likely.
 But he would still have been here with us.
 But there was one other thing that came into play that day.
 It was about, yeah, maybe two 2 1/2 inches wide.
 It was the edge of the metal door to that fuel shed.
 When the forklift knocked David across the heart, it shoved him backwards into the edge.
 The door edge of the.
 You will shed and it was the angle of.
 Movement of the forklift was exactly the same angle that the door was open.
 So when it struck him, it actually it shoved him back into the door, which did not crumple.
 It did not swing left.
 It did not swing right.
 It didn't crumple, it just stared as it was.
 So most of the force of that blow went into David's heart.
 I'll it literally broke his heart.
 If there's ever an altercation at a work site between a piece of motorized equipment or heavy equipment or machinery, there's an altercation between those and us.
 We will always lose.
 Because our bodies are not made to withstand those kinds of forces.
 If there's ever an altercation between us standing at height and & Oops, I'm falling, we will always lose.
 In the case of a fall, because our bodies are not made to withstand those kinds of forces.
 So therefore we have to look at Safety and prevention.
 Safety is everyone's responsibility.
 How David's death affected many, many people.
 I lost.
 The my only son, my youngest child.
 My baby didn't matter that he was all grown up and over six feet tall.
 I still told him, hey, it's my youngest child.
 You will always be my baby.
 And David would just smile and David would often tell me he'd say, mom, you know, as you get older or if if your health deteriorates a little bit, don't worry.
 Hey, I'll be here to help you and they no longer have that safety net.
 And some days that scares me.
 In the beginning I.
 I couldn't make sense to me because it wasn't enough information.
 How do you make sense of anything when you don't know for sure?
 Nobody knows exactly for sure what happened to David.
 It's just the OHSU investigators best guess.
 And that's what went into the final report.
 And it was eating away at my soul, not being able to make sense of anything.
 And and I kept asking myself.
 I, David, how could you have done something like that?
 Were you in a hurry?
 Were you distracted?
 Is that the way you always refilled the Fort?
 Refill fueled the forklift and nothing happened until the day something did happen.
 And it was absolutely making me crazy and angry.
 Night was so angry that David had died, but I recognize that and I did not like how I was feeling.
 So I chose to make peace with the fact that I will never know exactly what happened to David that day, and I let it go.
 And instead.
 I chose to focus.
 On the lasting David ever said to me, we were talking on the phone a few days before.
 David's death.
 And justice, before we hung up.
 David said one sentence, 3 words.
 The last thing David ever said to me was.
 I love you.
 And that's what I grabbed hold of.
 And love became my anchor and my life like.
 Because love never dies.
 It only grows stronger.
 You see my feeling angry and feeling crazy.
 Wasn't going to do anything to help me on my healing journey through grief.
 Love could.
 Love could help me on that journey.
 Eventually that is.
 A healing journey through grief is not a Sprint.
 It's a marathon.
 Now, so far as the Safety message, what I want to say is.
 Anybody who operates equipment get trained.
 David was very safety conscious but for some reason there is this disconnect on his work site about operating forklifts.
 And he had not had any formal training.
 If he didn't had formal training, management ought to have just said you don't operate the forklift, then only those who had formal training operated and David could have also refused and said I don't have formal training to do safe forklift operation.
 So I cannot do it until I do receive that training.
 So if you operate something get trained and trained properly.
 I would say I will never get over David's death, but I have learned to cope with it.
 I'm not the same person I was.
 But two, focusing on love.
 I've chosen to become a better person.
 Someone who's stronger and kinder and wiser and more compassionate.
 Caring and loving.
 So thank you, David.
 My beloved son for the gift of your last words.
 My daughter in law, she lost the love of her life.
 They just realized their dream of moving to a small rural area and that dream it's been shattered.
 And she is now a widow and a single parent of four young four children.
 Dave's four children no longer have their father to be with them, to watch TV shows with them.
 Take them to movies.
 Take them fishing.
 David won't be there for.
 Birthday celebrations and Christmas events.
 He won't be there for graduations and weddings.
 David will not be able to hold his grandchildren in his arms and shower them with love.
 And of course, there's the extended family.
 And I can't name everyone here, but I do wanna step to take.
 Talk about coworkers.
 And sometimes we forget the impact that this can help on coworkers just.
 When David's coworkers did find him, after about half an hour, when it hadn't come back from lunch, he trained first dater.
 Perform CPR valiantly until the paramedics came and took David to the hospital.
 A couple of days later that that trained first aider.
 Send a card over to where he's staying and in it, he wrote.
 I'm sorry.
 I wasn't able to save David.
 See to me, he did everything he could.
 He and he did it valiantly.
 He didn't stop until the paramedics came, but to him he failed.
 After David's funeral, his coworkers were standing in a group off to themselves, and they were All dejected.
 And he.
 They were stooped shoulders, their heads were hanging low and their eyes were staring at their shoes.
 He responsibility and guilt that they felt for David's death was crushing them.
 And I didn't want them to bear that burden because they've already been too much tragedy.
 So I went over to them and one by one, sometimes I had to take my, you know, their heads in my hands and pry them up.
 So I could see their eyes full of tears, and one by one I put my arms around when I said I will be OK.
 But your hearts beat peace.
 I still worry about David's coworkers.
 I still think about them.
 I hope they were able to support each other.
 And I hope they were able to get.
 Formal therapy, if that's what they needed.
 Then there were all sorts of other people.
 Excuse me, clean X break.
Perley Brewer   29:22
 Your two daughters.
Donna Van Bruggen   29:22
 That involved pardon me.
Perley Brewer   29:25
 Would you talk for a minute about your two daughters?
Donna Van Bruggen   29:31
 Hmm.
 Baby, we're crushed.
 They don't talk about David very much anymore.
 It's like they they just couldn't.
 It was too painful for them.
 And one of.
 David's.
 Have sisters and she had a son.
 He'd be about 8 years old now.
 She called his name David Aaron after my David Aaron.
 So it impacted.
 My 2 girls to the point where they they couldn't handle talking about it even.
Perley Brewer   30:32
 Trent of Life have they been able to help you through the process?
Donna Van Bruggen   30:38
 Threads of life has been amazing.
 I hadn't heard about threads of life.
 Prior and nobody told me about them.
 Like when when I say nobody, nobody like the OH&S investigators or the employer, nobody told me about them, but I just happened to come across a little blurb in an email that mentioned threads of life and I thought OK, I so I sent an email to them and that this group seems very legitimate.
 Looked on their website, it looked great, like, but there wasn't.
 A family form which is like a family Conference.
 We have those once a year through threads of life in four different parts of Canada.
 So I would go to the Western Canada 1.
 So it was almost a year after David's death, before there was that first one group meeting that I went to.
 And it was like a godsend to me in a way.
 It was so humbling.
 To sit or stand in a room full of people knowing they were going through what I was going through, many had experienced workplace fatalities.
 Some were living with Occupationally acquired injuries.
 And others had or.
 Sorry, somewhere living with severe injuries.
 Others had occupation acquired diseases.
 But knowing.
 That there was a group that was so caring and so supportive and so understanding it gave me strength beyond my own.
 To continue on my healing journey.
 And of course, since then I've gotten more involved with threads of life.
 I've become a speaker, then one of their.
 Go into your family guides, which can be it's volunteer family guys or where you work.
 One on one with a family member that's experiencing either a fatality or an injury for occupational disease as peer support.
 And then there's other programming that threads of life has.
 They have a monthly, sometimes weekly.
 Online programming, which could be anything from.
 Ohca session on music therapy, a session on psychology or in grief.
 A session on living with pain, if you if you have an injury, you name it.
 There's topic areas that are presented on them so you can sign up and from just watch online and you can connect with other people that way as well.
 So threads of life has been like I say, a godsend to me.
 And in the beginning, and even for some time after David's death, my role was to be the strong one, to be there for my daughter in law and my grandchildren.
 And I was OK with that role.
 Nobody forced it on me.
 I chose it because they needed my help and support and I am strong.
 But what it meant was that I had to set my own grief aside, and it wasn't until that very first threads of Life Western Canada Family Forum that I attended that that was the first time I could actually talk about what David's death meant to me as his mother.
 And that was very humbling as well.
 Is that you know, realizing this is the first time I've actually been able to talk about how I was impacted by David's death.
Perley Brewer   35:18
 What has helped you the most?
Donna Van Bruggen   35:22
 And threads of life.
Perley Brewer   35:23
 No, just generally.
Donna Van Bruggen   35:25
 Just generally.
Perley Brewer   35:31
 So obviously very, very hard, very painful to serve been anyone thing or any person that's.
 So to help you through this.
Donna Van Bruggen   35:41
 Of course, there are people at threads of life that you know.
 I met at my first family farm and I continue.
 Sometimes we only meet once a year at a family forum, but we can connect by email or something like that, so that those friendships continue and are very meaningful.
 Um.
 I also find it very meaningful in being able to talk about David, for instance, like something like this Podcast.
 So and for some people, they just couldn't.
 I think it's too emotional, but for me it's been part of my healing journey.
 And so it doesn't mean it's always easy, but that has been part of my healing journey is and.
 And it's a way for me to honor David's memory as well.
 And of course, there is some of the programming that we've had have just been absolutely wonderful.
 Like I say, with programming that's that's just like now, but you have to do this when in person pretty well is, you know if you're playing drum therapy and somebody brings in a bunch of drums, you pretty well have to be in person.
 But some of the sessions I've attended have been exactly what I've needed, so whether it's a session on grief.
 Or it's a session on uh, you know, losing a child cause that's so in our culture, probably in many cultures, parents are not supposed to bury their children.
 And the parents are it's the opposite of that.
 And so that can be very difficult.
 So they're sessions on I've attended that have been on.
 You know when parents who have lost a child, I've even been on some on some sessions where you have a good laugh because it's.
 I'm not really not say it's not based on comedy, but it is where you're free to laugh if you need to.
 And all of that is been very helpful and very healing.
 So I don't think it's been one thing.
 I think it's been many things.
 And it's the time, of course, and I'm a little further along my healing journey than somebody who may just have lost someone to a fatality.
 And so I have to, you know, people are further down the road can then be a shoulder to cry on, have a listening ear, you know, peer support for for others that are.
 They're coming along the way because we need each other.
Perley Brewer   38:39
 So one last question, Donna, how are you doing today?
Donna Van Bruggen   38:45
 Today I'm I'm doing fine.
 You can tell every now and then my voice will choke a little bit or always say clean next break cause I bring a Kleenex up.
 If if I I do tend to get a little weepy eyed and I it's it's still difficult.
 But like I I I had mentioned this is this is part of my healing journey.
 This is part of what I do for myself as well and and I do find it healing and therapeutic, even if there's tears.
Perley Brewer   39:24
 Wow, it's a I don't know what to say.
 Really don't know other than obviously David was a special son and obviously he's in your heart everyday.
 Thank.
Donna Van Bruggen   39:36
 Yes.
Perley Brewer   39:36
 Thank you very much for sharing your story with our listeners and.
 Really.
 Just thank you for all that you continuing to do to help others as well.
Donna Van Bruggen   39:50
 It now it's my honor to be able to to do that.
Perley Brewer   39:55
 So thank God I would like to thank the folks for listening in today and for listening to Donna's story.
 Stay safe and we will talk to you again next week.