It was while working on a logging road over a bog that the accident occurred. The 14-tonne excavator went through the ice on a small pond out on the marsh. Hampus Jakobsson got stuck in the machine, which sank to a depth of four meters.
"It should never have happened," says Kristin Jakobsson, Hampus' mother, who believes that Hampus was not sufficiently informed that there was a pond on the marsh.
"Disappearing in a dark pond"
SCA, which ordered the job, claims that it provided the contractor, who then hired Hampus as machine operator, with clear instructions. At the same time, the parents see the horror scenario in front of them.
"Our son has drowned, he was trapped in a cab, anyone who has children can imagine the horror and the feeling when you sit in a machine and disappear into a dark pond," says Hampus' father Peter Jakobsson.
Lack of information?
Peter and Kristin claim that they received indications that the information was inadequate. They were shown a map sketch of the transport route, something Hampus showed before the accident. On the sketch there was no water marked. The map may still be in Hampus' phone, which was confiscated by the police.
"My son didn't have any training in forestry, he worked with pulling fibre and driving an excavator in the summer," says Peter Jakobsson, who wonders if everything has gone right.
The accident is being investigated by the forest company SCA, the Swedish Work Environment Authority and the National Unit for Environmental and Work Environment Cases.
In the video, SVT examines the course of events and the forest company SCA comments on the parents' criticism.