Environment & Energy
Showing Original Post only (View all)Wow! A whopping $11,000 fine for poisoning 300,000 people! [View all]
What will our capitalist masters think of next??
The Charleston Gazette
Charleston, WV
Monday, July 7, 2014
OSHA fines Freedom $11K in chemical spill
By From staff, wire reports
A federal agency has fined the company that spilled chemicals into West Virginias largest drinking water supply $11,000 for a pair of workplace safety violations.
The Labor Departments Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined Freedom Industries $7,000 for keeping storage tanks containing crude MCHM behind a diked wall that was not liquid tight. On Jan. 9, roughly 10,000 gallons of MCHM leaked from one of the tanks and through the riverside diked wall and left 300,000 residents without clean water for days.OSHA also fined Freedom Industries $4,000 for failing to have standard railings on an elevated platform.
Inspectors classified both of those citations as serious, meaning the workplace hazards could cause an accident or illness that would most likely result in death or serious physical harm.
OSHA also issued to Freedom one other-than-serious citation, alleging the company did not properly label one of its chemical storage tanks at the Elk River site. OSHA said that one of the tanks not the one that leaked on Jan. 9 was labeled as containing glycerin, when it actually contained MCHM....
- See more at: http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20140707/GZ01/140709509/1419#sthash.DlqXvG4p.dpuf