Portside

At least six workers in a Tennessee plastics factory are dead or missing after managers allegedly told them not to evacuate despite urgent warnings of severe flash flooding. What does this tragedy say about the unique threat that workers face from climate change and related adverse weather events?

Climate change is not a hoax, as some politicians continue to argue.  It is very real as we witnessed most recently the past several days as a climate change-fueled hurricane wreaked havoc and death from Floridaas far north as eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina. Hundreds are confirmed dead and many more are still missing.

Hurricanes, floods, heat, fires and other severe weather phenomena have the potential of hitting everyone. Some — who may live on the coast or in a fire-prone areas — may be more at risk than city-dwellers, but Hurricane Helene has shown us that few locations are immune, even for people who thought they were protected because they lived in an inland city like Asheville or up in the mountains far from the hurricane-prone coasts.

While anyone can be at risk from adverse weather events, workers bear an added element of risk because of the jobs they do and their lack of control in their workplaces. Must attention has been paid over the past few years to the growing number of worker illnesses and deaths from heat exposure — and the  federal government as well as a growing number of cities and states are slowly taking action to protect workers. (At the same time, some states — like Texas and Florida — are heading the other direction — making it more difficult for localities to protect workers from the effects of high heat.)  Many of the jobs most at risk, for example agriculture and construction, have large numbers of immigrant workers who may not feel protected complaining to OSHA or other authorities about unsafe working conditions

But the threat to workers is not just from the elements. It’s not just from Mother Nature, however climate-altered she has become. Worker risk is also a function of workers’ power in the workplace — or lack thereof. Where they work, the conditions they work under and their ability to protect themselves against obvious threats make workers more vulnerable than average citizens to the risks posed by climate change.

The threat to workers is not just from the elements. It’s not just from Mother Nature, however climate-altered she has become. Worker risk is also a function of workers’ power in the workplace — or lack thereof. Where they work, the conditions they work under and their ability to protect themselves against obvious threats make workers more vulnerable than average citizens to the risks posed by climate change.

Most people, when they receive hurricane or flood warning, have the option of evacuating from their homes and heading to a safer location. Facing high heat, most people have the ability to live and work in air-conditioned homes and offices, or retreat into air-conditioned shops or cars during a severe heat wave.  Even the effects of wildfire smoke can be minimized by staying in a climate-controlled dwelling.

But workers often are not in control of their working conditions or safety. If workers who labor outdoors are not  allowed to take rest breaks in the shade without being threatened with discipline,  if they don’t have access to water during a heat wave without being  or if can’t protect themselves from toxic wildfire smoke without risking their jobs, or if they’re not allowed leave work in the face of and approaching tornado or floods without fear of being fired — what we’re seeing is basic job blackmail: your job or your life.

And these are not just theoretical risk, as we’re now seeing down in Tennessee.

Impact Plastics

This problem for workers was no better illustrated than what we’re learning from the tragedy at Impact Plastics in Erwin, Tennessee, where at least six workers were swept away  by the flooded Nolichucky Rive. Three workers died: Rosa Andrade,
Liliana Verdugo, Monica Hernández and Bertha Mendoza. Three remain missing. Many of the workers at the plant are Hispanic.

At least one survivor and families of the missing workers say they were not allowed to evacuate despite increasing urgent warnings. Given the known path of the Hurricane, workers are wondering why they were even forced to come to work that day.

Impact Plastics is denying the allegations, claimed that workers were allowed to leave on time, and their jobs weren’t threatened if they left. “When water began to cover the parking lot and the adjacent service road, and the plant lost power, employees were dismissed by management to return to their homes in time for them to escape the industrial park. At no time were employees told that they would be fired if they left the facility.”

The company claims that they allowed employees to leave when water began covering the parking lot, but “While most employees left immediately, some remained on or near the premises for unknown reasons. ”

But Impact workers tell a different story.

Robert Jarvis, a worker at the plant,  reported that his bosses were hesitant to let employees leave the premises until it was too late.

“We were all working, and the power went out, and I got a text right when the power went out from another employee saying that the parking lot was flooded. I started walking out towards the break room — that’s where you walk out at to the parking lot — and I seen the parking lot flooded,” Jarvis recalled. “And I was like, ‘what do I do?’ And they told me to move my car. So I went to go move my car to higher ground, which it was still in water, there was no dry ground in that parking lot, I got out, I said ‘Can we leave?’ And the woman said ‘no, not until I speak with Gerry [Impact Plastics founder Gerald O’Connor].”

“About 10 minutes later she came back and said ‘y’all can leave.’ It was too late,” Jarvis continued. “We had one way in, one way out, and when they told us we could leave, the one way out was blocked off. So we were stuck in traffic blocked on that road waiting to see what we were gonna do. Because everyone knew it was one way.”

Another worker described how the company ignored the imminent threat until it was too late:

Jacob Ingram, a mold changer at the company, told the Knoxville News Sentinel that as the flooding started, managers instructed employees to move their cars away from the rising water – but would not let them leave. “They should’ve evacuated when we got the flash flood warnings, and when they saw the parking lot,” he said to the newspaper. “When we moved our cars, we should’ve evacuated then … we asked them if we should evacuate, and they told us not yet, it wasn’t bad enough.

“And by the time it was bad enough, it was too late – unless you had a four-wheel drive.”

Ingram told the Knoxville News Sentinel that he and 10 other employees later tried to leave by taking refuge on an open-bed truck. Debris hit the truck, made two people fall into the water and eventually caused the truck to flip.

Weak Legal Protections

The Occupational Safety and Health Act, passed in 1970, was supposed to eliminate job blackmail. Employers were given full responsibility for maintaining a safe workplace and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration was created to enforce the law and the standards that OSHA established. No longer would workers be forced to choose between their jobs and their lives.

But the promise of OSHA was never fully realized.  The agency has been chronically underfunded, new standards can take decades to issue, workers who are not represented by unions have trouble exercising their rights under the law — especially the right to refuse imminently dangerous work — and the political power of the business community and the Republican party have obstructed efforts to address these problems.

The impact of climate change and severe weather events on workers has been especially difficult for OSHA to address.  The agency is working on a heat standard which was launched early in the Biden administration. But it will likely take close to two years before that standard is finalized — and only if Kamala Harris wins the presidency.   A re-elected President Trump will do the bidding of his business backers and stall the standard indefinitely.

There are no OSHA standard directly addressing the problems faced by the workers at Impact Plastics.

OSHA faced a similar situation in December 2021 when 16 workers were killed when huge tornadoes ripped into the Mayfield Consumer Products plant in western Kentucky and an Amazon warehouse in Edwardsville, Illinois.  OSHA investigated the Amazon plant, where six workers died,  but the agency declined to cite the company because there was no OSHA standard specifically covering that situation. When there is no specific OSHA standard that covers a hazard, OSHA turns to legally burdensome General Duty Clause — Section 5(a)(1) of the OSHAct — which requires employers to provide a safe workplace.  But the General Duty Clause is vulnerable to legal challenge and in the Amazon case, OSHA eventually determined that “no OSHA standard applies and it is not considered appropriate at this time to invoke Section 5(a)(1).”

Instead, the agency sent Amazon a Hazard Alert Letter (HAL) describing three major failures in Amazon’s emergency response program that led to the fatalities. OSHA sends HALs when there is not enough evidence to sustain a General Duty Clause violation. The letter identified risk factors and recommended to the employer “that you voluntarily take the necessary steps to eliminate or materially reduce your employees’ exposure to the risk factors described above.”

Kentucky OSHA took a more aggressive approach, issuing a $40,000 citation against Mayfield Consumer Products. The main standards cited addressed the plant’s failure to secure exit routes or develop emergency action plans and alarms.

What Is To Be Done?

Climate change is here, it is getting worse, and as citizens of Tennessee and western North Carolina who live far from the hurricane-prone coast have learned, no place is safe anymore.  Workers have much less control over how to respond to climate emergencies than the general population. Worker safety laws are weak, and there are few adequate OSHA standards covering climate emergencies. OSHA is working on a heat standard, and a standard that would protect emergency responders, but no work has been done to address the hazards that killed the Impact, Amazon or Mayfield workers.

Workers desperately need enhanced protections — OSHA standard or laws, for example that allow workers to leave a workplace or shelter in place in the face of severe weather alerts.  Workers and supervisors need to be trained in how to respond to the growing variety of threats facing the world — particularly the world of work.

And employers need to face consequences for threatening workers with their jobs when the seek to protect themselves.

Immigrant rights groups like the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) are working with the Impact workers and providing needed legal support. TIRRC Executive Director Lisa Sherman Luna stated that

From providing multilingual warnings and information before, during, and after instances of severe weather to prioritizing outreach and recovery efforts in under-resourced communities, it’s clear all cities across the state must do more to ensure they are prepared for the next time disaster strikes. And while today we focus on meeting the needs of people displaced by this impact of climate change, we must also call our government to take steps to reverse the course of climate change, from investing in clean energy and common sense measures to protect our environment, so that Tennesseans have the freedom to breathe fresh air, drink clean water, and thrive for generations to come.

The Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA) issued a statement, stating in part:

“Any loss of life is a tragedy, but the preventable loss of life, where productivity is prioritized over human safety, is nothing short of disgraceful,” said LCLAA’s National President, Evelyn DeJesus. This tragedy has profoundly hit the growing Latino community in Erwin, Tennessee, especially hard and should serve as a sobering reminder to local officials. Latinos make up 8% of the population here, and they must not be treated as expendable. Distressed families have questioned officials on why they had not been asked for photos or information to help identify their missing loved ones. They have expressed frustration at the lack of support in locating their loved ones, which is simply unacceptable, and we must do better.

Local authorities are responding.  Tennessee OSHA is now investigating Impact Plastics, as well the fact that Impact did not notify Tennessee OSHA of the workers’ deaths. The Texas Bureau of Investigation (TBI) has also launched an investigation. The TBI has more authority to pursue criminal charges than OSHA.

But it’s not enough to act after workers have already died. Congress, state legislatures and Federal, state and local authorities need to put a special focus on the unique problems that workers face as a result of climate change-related weather events. It’s already too late for some, but the threat of climate change –and the need to address related workplace issues — will only get more urgent.