ANAHEIM : Worker Dies After Losing Arm, Legs

A 31-year-old man who lost both his legs and an arm Monday after being caught in a large grinding machine died several hours later.

Juan Mendoza went into cardiac arrest while 10 firefighters struggled for 30 minutes to remove him from the machine, which is used to grind plastics at Marketing Associates, 1818 Orangethorpe Park, said Steve Magliocco, a spokesman for the Anaheim Fire Department.

Mendoza was revived after being flown to UCI Medical Center in Orange. His legs and his right arm were mangled so badly that they had to be amputated, Magliocco said. He also suffered multiple breaks and cuts to his left arm, Magliocco said.

Mendoza had apparently disconnected a circuit breaker to the machine and climbed inside to clean it around 10:30 a.m. when someone flipped the breaker switch and the machine started, Magliocco said.

“Evidently someone inadvertently flipped the breaker switch which controls the machine,” Magliocco said. “It was an incredibly terrible thing to happen.”

Representatives of Marketing Associates did not return phone calls.

Jim Brown, district manager of Cal-OSHA, said an investigation of the incident was underway. He said Marketing Associates had no record of other accidents, but he declined further comment.