Did Amazon boost air-conditioning after a worker died?
- Amazon upgraded an air conditioning system at a New Jersey warehouse where a worker’s died during a heat wave,” according to NBC News.
- The news site was able to obtain photos of the new ducting system after the company said the worker’s death was caused by a “personal medical condition.”
- Workers claimed the new system was added weeks after Rafael Reynaldo Mota Frias died in mid-July.
- Employees also said more fans had been installed around the warehouse in recent weeks.
OSHA charges candle manufacturer after tornado outbreak
- Mayfield Consumer Products violated OSHA standards at a Graves County, Kentucky, candle factory during a tornado outbreak in December.
- The Mayfield Consumer facility collapsed when an EF-4 tornado struck the building, around 100 people were inside and nine were killed.
- The violations include “maintenance, safeguards, and operational features for exit routes,” two under “emergency action plans” and four in “bloodborne pathogens.”
- Mayfield Consumer faces a $40,000 fine.
Recycling companies failed to use fire safety plans
- Employees for Carlos Arturo Guerrero LLC — operating as CAG Professional Services—were working on a jack-up drilling platform in Texas.
- Other employees of PH Steel Inc were also working at the site in Texas when a fire broke out and caused damage to the platform’s generator wires.
- Nine workers were trapped 280 feet high because there was no fire safety plan and were rescued by a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter.
- OSHA proposed penalties of $140,055 for CAG Professional Services and $72,511 for PH Steel.
Florida farm worker dies of heat illness
- OSHA found a 35-year-old farmworker died from heat illness on a Duette, Fla., farm on his second day on the job.
- An employee of Citrus Harvesting Inc. was harvesting strawberries at 5:45 p.m. when others observed the worker showing signs of disorientation and he later died.
- OSHA cited the Wauchula farm for exposing workers to hazards associated with high ambient heat and failing to ensure workers were adequately trained on first aid.
- The contractor faces $29,004 in proposed penalties.