Highlights of OSHA's Report on Imperial Sugar

OSHA released the following information:

• The catastrophic accident at the Imperial Sugar Refinery in Port Wentworth, Georgia, occurred on February 7, and killed 13 and injured another 40 employees.


• OSHA responded immediately. The Agency’s field office in Savannah, Georgia dispatched two compliance officers and opened its investigation within two hours.


• Over the course of the investigation, OSHA sent 18 personnel under the supervision of senior staff – including two attorneys from the Department of Labor’s Solicitor’s Office and an explosives expert from the National Office – to the site. In addition, OSHA retained an outside expert on combustible dust to provide technical assistance.


• On March 7^th OSHA sent a letter to Mr. John Sheptor, the CEO of Imperial Sugar, advising him of the seriousness of the combustible dust issue and that Imperial Sugar needed to take appropriate corrective actions to address any possible combustible dust hazards at its other refinery in Gramercy, Louisiana.


• On March 14^th, OSHA initiated a separate inspection at the Gramercy refinery. On the first day of the on-site inspection, OSHA’s compliance officers (CSHOs) discovered massive quantities of combustible dust in the powder mill that also contained potential ignition sources. OSHA posted an imminent danger notice – another extremely rare action that resulted in a temporary shut-down of the mill.


• The Port Wentworth investigation resulted in proposed penalties of more than $5 million in citations alleging 69 willful citations, 61 of which were instance-by-instance violations of OSHA standards directly related to reducing the risk of combustible dust explosions.


• At the close of the Gramercy inspection, OSHA issued citations alleging 49 willful (47 instance-by-instance) and 42 serious violations, and proposing penalties of more than $3.7 million.


• The cases against both Imperial Sugar refinery sites resulted in a combined total proposed penalty of more than $8.7 million, the third highest proposed penalty in the Agency’s history.


• The company was aware of what the combustible dust hazards were and they did not take the necessary steps to abate these hazards.