Two serious tire incidents in Canada highlight the catastrophic risks hiding in routine workplace maintenance
Two recent incidents in Canada – one fatal, one critically injuring a worker – have cast a harsh light on the hazards of tire service in industrial settings, and a leading North American tire safety expert says the risks are widely underestimated, especially among non-tire professionals.
Kevin Rohlwing, Chief Technical Officer at the Tire Industry Association (TIA) in the United States, spoke with Canadian Occupational Safety to offer safety leaders across heavy industry a clearer picture of what can go wrong, and why.
"The people that are not tire professionals are the ones that typically have the least amount of respect for tires," Rohlwing said. "They don't recognize the hazard they're dealing with. 'Oh, that's just tires. I'm not worried about tires.'"
Rare but catastrophic
Tire service incidents represent only fractions of a per cent of the millions of tires serviced each year across cars, trucks, earth movers, farm equipment, and forklifts. But low frequency does not mean low risk.
"When there is an incident, when there is a problem, it's usually pretty catastrophic," Rohlwing said. "There's a tremendous amount of force inside an inflated tire. And when something goes wrong, when something breaks, it's going to release that force. And if you're in the wrong place at the wrong time, it's going to probably end tragically."
He draws a clear distinction between preventable and unpreventable incidents – some accidents occur despite proper procedures, while others trace back to inadequate training, missing safety equipment, or a failure to recognise the hazard at all.
The three hazard areas safety leaders need to know
Rohlwing identified three categories where most fatality-type accidents occur among general service personnel – critical intervention points for safety professionals managing fleets in construction, mining, forestry, oil and gas, and other heavy industries.
The first is jacking and lifting. Any vehicle being serviced must have secondary support beyond the hydraulic jack alone.
"Working on a vehicle that's only supported by a jack is incredibly dangerous," he said. "You're basically entrusting your life to a $1 or $2 plastic silicone seal at the base of the ram of the jack. That's what's carrying all the weight."
The second involves multi-piece tire assemblies, common on heavy equipment. These must be fully deflated before loosening lug nuts and removing them from the axle, as inflated defective components can separate violently.
"A lot of accidents occur that way," he said. "In the process of removing it from the axle, because it's fully inflated, it separates and that usually ends very tragically for the technician standing in front of that."
The third area is inflation. Rohlwing recommends clip-on chucks, inline pressure gauges, and restraining devices – commonly called safety cages – for off-vehicle tire inflation.
"I always tell students when I'm teaching classes that if you're inflating a tire and you can read the sidewall, you're in the wrong place. You should be aligned with the tread."
Questions linger over Ottawa fatality
A 20-year-old Ottawa mechanic died in May 2026 while working on a tire, prompting an Ontario Ministry of Labour investigation. The ministry indicated that steel belts around the bead of a brand-new tire shifted relative to the rubber, causing a rupture. Separately, a $55,000 fine was issued to a Dryden tire retailer after a skidder wheel explosion critically injured a worker.
Rohlwing said the ministry's description of the Ottawa fatality did not align with his understanding of tire mechanics.
"That doesn't make sense," he said. "The steel belts go around the outside of the tire – that's on the tread side, the road side. And I've never in 44 years of being in this industry heard, seen or been aware of those belts actually separating on the tread side during service."
He suggested the incident may have involved a bead failure or zipper rupture but said he would need more detail before drawing any conclusion. Given that it was a new tire, he noted it could fall into the unpreventable category.
The investigation is ongoing. Safety professionals in industries where heavy-duty tire service is routine can review workplace safety standards for vehicle maintenance operations and assess whether their technicians have received adequate training and equipment.
"Tire safety starts here," Rohlwing said. "Anytime we can raise awareness and prevent injuries when tires and vehicles are being serviced, that's kind of our mission statement."
