- Why did you or your predecessor ignore dust problems that led to the death of (at least) 12 of your employees?
- Why wasn't the plant in compliance with NFPA combustible dust standards?
- Do you expect a large penalty from OSHA? Do you think that would be justified?
- What changes are you going to make in Imperial's safety program to ensure that this doesn't happen again here or in any of your other facilities?
- How does the company's negligence in this case differ from a drunk driver killing a family?
- Do you think there should be an OSHA standard that requires compliance with NFPA standards?
- As "leader of this organization," to what extent do you hold yourself or the Imperial Board of Directors responsible for the deaths of (at least) 12 of your employees? How are you going to show that you're holding yourself and your board responsible?
One-on-One with Imperial Sugar CEO
Thursday, Feb 28, 2008 - 10:35 PM Updated: 11:11 PM
By Alice Massimi
The CEO of Imperial Sugar for only nine days and inside the sugar refinery the night of the explosion, John Sheptor has had a rough few weeks, to say the least.
But despite the tragedy, Sheptor has held it all together something he says he had to do.
News Three's Alice Massimi had the chance to sit down one-on-one with Sheptor today.
John Sheptor says he made the decision the moment he heard the first explosion, as leader of this organization he would need to be present and available for his employees. A decision that's probably been difficult to live up to, but one Mr. Sheptor says has been guided by his faith.
John Sheptor had only been on the job for 9 days, when he made the trip from Imperial Sugar's headquarters in Texas to Port Wentworth to meet his employees. “One of the early priorities that I had was to meet with as many employees of the company as possible to talk about my vision for the company, but more importantly listen to them with regard to their ideas,” explains Sheptor. He was getting ready to take a tour of the facility, walk around and meet some of the employees.
It was around seven o’clock on Thursday night. Mr. Sheptor had no idea how drastically his life was about to change.“The gravity you can't help at that moment feel the weight of the injuries that we saw and the perspective that we may have suffering people in the building in the middle of the fire,” recalls Sheptor. Since that night Sheptor has taken the lead, visiting burn patients in Augusta, spending time with the families of those lost, and making sure his employees know he's there for them.
“I think that as the leader of this organization I need to be present and available,” he explains. Not an easy task.“I have lived this experience with every family I have lived the experience at the hospitals when the doctors have made the questions to the family do we stop life support or not.” A difficult role for anyone, but one he says he's found the strength to perform because of one thing -- his faith.
“I have as much as I possibly can, been a member of this community during this time and done my best to bring a sense of hope and optimism for all that have these needs.”
Another thing to keep in is mind is that through all this, Mr. Sheptor has not had his family here to lean on. But he says he's been welcomed here with open arms, invited to more dinners then he’ll ever be able to go to, and officially made part of the family when he was given a Dixie Crystal jacket by an employee.
Sheptor says he just hopes he's been able to help this family through such a tragedy.
By Alice Massimi
The CEO of Imperial Sugar for only nine days and inside the sugar refinery the night of the explosion, John Sheptor has had a rough few weeks, to say the least.
But despite the tragedy, Sheptor has held it all together something he says he had to do.
News Three's Alice Massimi had the chance to sit down one-on-one with Sheptor today.
John Sheptor says he made the decision the moment he heard the first explosion, as leader of this organization he would need to be present and available for his employees. A decision that's probably been difficult to live up to, but one Mr. Sheptor says has been guided by his faith.
John Sheptor had only been on the job for 9 days, when he made the trip from Imperial Sugar's headquarters in Texas to Port Wentworth to meet his employees. “One of the early priorities that I had was to meet with as many employees of the company as possible to talk about my vision for the company, but more importantly listen to them with regard to their ideas,” explains Sheptor. He was getting ready to take a tour of the facility, walk around and meet some of the employees.
It was around seven o’clock on Thursday night. Mr. Sheptor had no idea how drastically his life was about to change.“The gravity you can't help at that moment feel the weight of the injuries that we saw and the perspective that we may have suffering people in the building in the middle of the fire,” recalls Sheptor. Since that night Sheptor has taken the lead, visiting burn patients in Augusta, spending time with the families of those lost, and making sure his employees know he's there for them.
“I think that as the leader of this organization I need to be present and available,” he explains. Not an easy task.“I have lived this experience with every family I have lived the experience at the hospitals when the doctors have made the questions to the family do we stop life support or not.” A difficult role for anyone, but one he says he's found the strength to perform because of one thing -- his faith.
“I have as much as I possibly can, been a member of this community during this time and done my best to bring a sense of hope and optimism for all that have these needs.”
Another thing to keep in is mind is that through all this, Mr. Sheptor has not had his family here to lean on. But he says he's been welcomed here with open arms, invited to more dinners then he’ll ever be able to go to, and officially made part of the family when he was given a Dixie Crystal jacket by an employee.
Sheptor says he just hopes he's been able to help this family through such a tragedy.
8 comments:
Imperial Sugar was well aware of the problem. For instance a decade ago, back in August of 1998 the sugar plant in Sugarland, Texas exploded because of a dust explosion.
Luckily only one injury. It's like the heart of Dixie was ripped out on the serene banks of the Savannah River.
I believe the entire general industry needs to be asked those questions.
KINGSTON URGES SWIFT ACTION
Department of Labor to send top investigator
Washington, Feb 28 -
In a conference call with Senator Johnny Isakson (R-Ga) and Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, Congressman Jack Kingston (GA-1) secured a commitment from the Department of Labor to send their top investigator to the site of the Imperial Sugar refinery explosion.
"Secretary Chao, Johnny, and I agree that we need to get to the root of what happened at the refinery," Congressman Kingston said. "This refinery is at the heart of our community and as we continue recovery and look to rebuild, we need to make sure this tragedy won't happen again."
During the call, Secretary Chao indicated she plans to send the head of the Occupation and Health Safety Administration, Ed Foulke, to the site on Monday. Mr. Foulke will be charged with determining whether current safety regulations are sufficient to protect workers. At Kingston's urging, Mr. Foulke will discuss the explosion and safeguards against future disasters with local media outlets.
"It's important to get this right. Workers must be protected. And safety must come first," said Congressman Kingston. "We must do anything that can be done to prevent another disaster. At the same time, rushing to the wrong fix could mean this plant and others like it could be moved to Mexico. We need to get the regulatory agencies, workers, and the chemists all on the same page."
"Johnny worked very closely with Senator Kennedy on the West Virginia and Utah mine disasters. Together, they came up with a balanced approach to prevent that kind of thing from happening again," Congressman Kingston said. "I know that Johnny has already had conversations with Senator Kennedy about our refinery and a well thought out solution like theirs would be very helpful in our situation"
According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearm, the explosion which shook Port Wentworth on February 7 was caused by combustible dust which ignited in the basement connecting two of the plant's three silos. While OSHA maintains regulations on dust, some, including the Chemical Safety Board, have called on tougher restrictions.
Dear Congressman Kingston,
It's commendable that you are trying to get to the root of the problem regarding combustible dust explosion at Dixie Crystal. The same company had a combustible dust explosion at their Sugarland, Tx refinery in 1998. They are aware of the problem. but so far no action
The problem is that the industry has known of the problem even before the combustible grain standard was passed in 1987. In fact the National Academy of Sciences recommended that a dust standard also be implemented for general industry. Most recently the Chemical Safety Board made the same recommendation to the Secretary of Labor in 2006.
In the meantime there have been several other dust explosions since the Dixie Crystal incident. It appears that the business lobby is preventing costly standards from being implemented. How many more combustible dust fires and explosions have to occur before an OSHA comprehensive is dust standard is implemented?
Here is a link to a GOOGLE map I've put together of 11 recent combustible dust fires and explosions since the Port Wentworth incident.
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=101786521158328646175.000446412740b19649bf8&z=5
Kind regards,
John Astad
“In a conference call with Senator Johnny Isakson (R-Ga) and Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, Congressman Jack Kingston (GA-1) secured a commitment from the Department of Labor to send their top investigator to the site of the Imperial Sugar refinery explosion. "Secretary Chao, Johnny, and I agree that we need to get to the root of what happened.”
Everyone already knows and has known what happened including the supervisor who said from the beginning it was probably a dust explosion. It would have been nice to prevent this from happening in the first place which was very feasible. Instead of expecting a company who already knows of the danger to voluntarily comply was beyond ignorant, IF THEY WERE GOING TO IN THE FIRST PLACE WE WOULD NOT NEED OSHA TO MAKE STANDARDS FOR THIS TYPE OF SITUATION! I do believe that OSHA is a necessity but only if it is working and in this case at the very least it has failed and fail miserably. Not only have they failed these families but the families that had lost loved ones previously and had deal with the system to gain the recommendations from the CSB to begin with. In essence the heads of OSHA have told the families in 2003 and those at the sugar plant it was not worth simply making a standard that was already set by the CSB. How much work would this have been for OSHA to just adopt it? If OSHA feels that they would volunteer to do so why not just make it a standard? Why because of this statement at the very beginning of the so called bulletin for combustible dust “This Safety and Health Information Bulletin is not a standard or regulation, and it creates no new legal obligations.”
“MR. Foulke will be charged with determining whether current safety regulations are sufficient to protect workers”
Durrrrrfff what regulations, the bulletin?
Mr. Foulke, please the same man who put “Adult’s Do The Darndest Things” out which basically advocated for the blame the workers campaign in doing so.
Yes I am mad, I’m mad as hell and if you truly believe this then you have been blinded because if anything is done it will because there is little chose left. OSHA has had since before 2003 to act upon this issue and only placed a bulletin because the CSB was insisting on a appropriate response to their recommendations.
The damage is already done so the blame game is as senseless as not gaining the regulation to begin with. We don’t want some half baked BS any longer, damn it get off your butts and save some lives.
Since When is Fook a top investigator? Is this a joke? Choo must had dragged Fook out under the desk kicking and screaming.
Exactly, when did "Fook" ever become the top investigator? Answer never, he's another polical hack that will sing the party line when asked.
UFCW take note to get a combustible dust standard the agency will have to be sued.
Fook going to Savannah is synonymous with Brown going to New Orleans.
They never learn.
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