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An unknown man met a gruesome end on Tuesday morning in Arnhem, the Netherlands. The man was probably sleeping in a paper container and ended up in the garbage truck during collection.
Tuesday May 7, 2024 at 8:25 PM
The tragedy happened at the Maisveld in Arnhem. A Pro Zero garbage truck picked up a large wheelie bin there at just after eight o’clock on Tuesday morning to empty it. This involved a so-called cracking press, a truck in which the waste is immediately compressed to gain space.
What the collectors had not seen at that time was that someone was sleeping in that container, among the paper. The man apparently slept so deeply that he was not woken when the contents of the container were dumped into the garbage truck.
An employee of the household waste service quickly realized that something was going wrong and therefore pressed the emergency button, immediately blocking the pressing system. But apparently it was already too late.
The driver of the garbage truck had no choice but to dump some of the collected garbage on the street in order to reach the unfortunate victim. He was seriously injured and bleeding profusely, witnesses say.
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The emergency services quickly arrived on the scene. The victim was resuscitated for a long time. An emergency intervention is said to have even been carried out at the scene of the tragedy. Afterwards he was taken to Nijmegen hospital. But a few hours later it was reported that he had died from his serious injuries.
The victim’s identity is not yet known. The Gelderland-Midden police speak of a ‘unique case’ and assume an unfortunate accident. In the neighborhood they say it is probably a homeless man. Last year in September, an employee of a waste company also died. He fell into the garbage truck during collection in Veldhoven, which is in Brabant. Employees involved in the incident are receiving victim assistance.