Koch Foods failed to properly train its workers ahead of a major fire at its Fairfield plant earlier this year, contributing to one man's death, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration found.
Chicago-based Koch Foods agreed to pay $167,000 in fines to OSHA after its investigators found several issues in how the company was keeping its employees safe and preparing them for disasters like February's fire, according to OSHA records.
During a late-night shift Feb. 15, hot oils caught fire above one of the grills in the plant, according to OSHA reports. The fire killed a 25-year-old and hospitalized two more workers after it engulfed most of the 600,000-square-foot building's roof. Highly toxic ammonia was nearly sent into the air after the roof collapsed
onto multiple gas tanks, prompting a brief shelter-in-place order for nearby residents.
Federal investigators said Koch Foods did not tell its employees and supervisors about its plan for where and when to evacuate during an emergency. The employee was then exposed to the flames after failing to evacuate and died from smoke inhalation.
Koch Foods also failed to make sure there were proper procedures for shutting down machines during maintenance, which put employees at risk of injury and may have caused the fire, according to OSHA reports.
There were also several pieces of electrical equipment with no markings to indicate its voltage, putting employees at risk of being shocked, the reports show.
Koch Foods did not respond to The Enquirer's questions asking whether it has changed any policies following the fire and OSHA's investigation.
Multiple OSHA visits found repeat issues at plant
In the months following the fire, federal investigators made multiple visits to the plant. On several occasions, investigators still found employees were failing to properly shut down the machines because Koch Foods had not properly trained them.
It's not the first time OSHA has cited Koch Foods for this. In 2023, investigators said the plant was putting workers at risk by failing to make sure machines were properly shut down during maintenance, records show.
The company settled with OSHA on Aug. 18, agreeing to fix the issues the agency identified by mid-October, records show. OSHA lowered the company's fines by $100,000, from $267,000, since Koch Foods agreed to settle.
The plant is Koch Foods' second manufacturing building on Commerce Center Drive and had opened recently before the fire. It was a $220 million project that added more than 600 jobs to the region.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Koch Foods failed to train workers ahead of Fairfield fire, OSHA finds
