An employee was giving hand signals to a forklift operator who was lowering a wacker packer into an elevator pit. The forklift operator had boomed out toward the elevator pit when the back wheels of the forklift lifted off the ground. The injured employee was standing on ground level on the other side of the pit. The forklift bucket then hit him at about shoulder level and traveled down his side, pushing him to the ground and coming to a rest on his leg. He suffered a broken ankle, torn ligaments and other damage to his knee, three broken ribs, and a fractured sternum.