Chevron Cited By OSHA In Deadly Explosion

The Occupational Safety and Healthy Administration (OSHA) issued $24,000 in citations to Chevron USA, Inc. for a deadly November 2013 explosion at the company's Pascagoula plant that killed a worker.

Following the deadly incident, OSHA officials immediately began a month-long investigation to determine the exact cause and whether or not it could have been prevented. According to OSHA's report, the explosion began as a result of a widespread power outage throughout the facility. 46-year-old Tonya Graddy was stationed at one of the plant's furnaces when the power went out. Normally, emergency shutdown measures are performed immediately after a power outage to prevent such disasters, but OSHA claims the Chevron did not properly train its workers on emergency shutdown protocol; thus, resulting in a deadly explosion that took the life of Graddy.

The report released by OSHA cites Chevron for failing to train its workers on how to perform an emergency shutdown. The furnace where Graddy was working exploded due to the power outage, killing the Alabama native.

It's important to note that Chevron is not legally required to pay the $24,000 citation issued by the OSHA. The company has three options and a 15-day window to decide their course of action. Chevron can comply and pay the penalty, request an informal meeting with OSHA officials, or contest the penalty. There's been no word yet on Chevron's course of action regarding OSHA's citation.

What's even more alarming is that Chevron, according to OSHA's report, was using the same startup procedure following power outages as it normally did when powering up the plant. This led to an unsafe environment that placed all of its workers in danger.

"Our thoughts remain with the Graddy family, as we know their grief does not end with the conclusion of these investigations. We remain dedicated to maintaining worker safety, and will apply the learnings from these investigations to our practices world-wide to ensure we are doing everything we can to prevent incidents like this from happening again," said Chevron Public Affairs Manager Alan Sudduth.

Of course, this isn't the first time Chevron has been in hot water by OSHA. In 2003, an employee was killed when he fell from an elevated scaffolding. In 2007, a major fire was started that burned over 300,000 barrels of crude oil per day. Thankfully, there were no deaths in the latter case, but it was still a serious environmental concern that affected the entire region.