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Home / Archives / News Archive 2002 / AeroTech responds to safety report
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AeroTech responds to safety report |
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2002 Archived News by AeroTech
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Wednesday, September 11, 2002 |
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LAS VEGAS, Nevada USA -- In the aftermath of the tragic events of October 15, 2001, the Clark County Executive asked that the Nevada Department of Public Safety conduct an investigation into "the actions of the Clark County Fire Department before, during and after the fire that occurred at AeroTech." The report resulting from that investigation was released by Clark County on August 9, 2002.
Despite the fact that the county itself was to have been the subject of the investigation, the report was delivered to the County before it was released to the public. Repeated attempts to clarify what happened between the time it was delivered to the county and the time it was released have failed to reveal whether the report was edited by the county before its release to the public. Recently, despite prior representations to the contrary, both the Department of Public Safety and the County have refused to release copies of the material compiled as a result of the investigation to the public, foiling any attempt at an independent evaluation of those materials.
Although lengthy, the report concentrates on details of alleged zoning issues, most of which occurred years before the fire and have little or nothing to do with its cause. Despite its litany of technicalities, the report makes clear that all of the alleged violations were minor and that no agency of Clark County ever took any enforcement action against AeroTech, its officers or employees. What is more, the report makes clear that all of the agencies with responsibility for regulating AeroTech were fully aware of its operations and allowed them to continue.
About six months prior to the October fire, AeroTech voluntarily called in the Nevada Safety Consultation and Training Section ("SCATS") program. The SCATS program allows companies to call in Occupational Health and Safety Specialists who conduct rigorous inspections of the business. As an incentive to those who have called in these voluntary inspections, the program allows six months in which to address any issues identified in the inspection. During that period, the business and the inspector work cooperatively to ensure that the workplace is made safer. On October 15, 2001, that six month period had not yet expired.
During its inspection, the SCATS representative identified a number of issues and AeroTech addressed each one of them. Although that process was not quite complete on October 15, two things have to be kept in mind. First, AeroTech was still within the six month window allowed by the law in which to address the issues raised in the inspection. Second, as the SCATS representative made clear in the report, SCATS did not consider any of the issues it identified as being imminently dangerous and would have granted additional time to AeroTech, had an extension been requested.
Here's the part that's a little hard to understand. The law "wipes the slate clean" after the SCATS representative leaves. That is, once the SCATS process is completed, OSHES is free to issue citations even for conditions that the SCATS representatives did not find as violations or which the SCATS representative found to be completely abated. That's basically what happened here. The violations alleged by OSHES after the fire consist almost entirely of conditions which the SCATS program did not find in violation or which they (and, for that reason, AeroTech) believed to have been completely addressed. In other words, before the fire, AeroTech believed in good faith that it was complying with all of the SCATS mandates, and thus, was in compliance with all applicable OSHES regulations.
Based, in part, on its cooperation with SCATS, OSHES and AeroTech settled all issues arising from the fires on July 8, 2002. AeroTech entered into the settlement without admitting any guilt regarding the violations alleged by OSHES and reserved its right to contest any allegation arising from OSHES' actions.
One more thing needs to be cleared up. The first fire started because an AeroTech employee violated a published safety rule. There is no question that, had the rule been followed, the initial fire would not have occurred. Each and every AeroTech employee interviewed by the Department of Public Safety told them that the rules were well communicated, thoroughly enforced, and repeatedly addressed at safety meetings. Not a single employee said that he had any trouble understanding the safety rules.
The fire was indeed a tragedy. AeroTech is a small company. Most of our employees had worked there for years and many of them recommended the company to their relatives. It was, in many respects, a family. The loss of Avelino Corpuz left a wound in our family that may never heal completely. The cowardly, misinformed and spiteful attacks that have been made lately are not just libelous but they are hurtful. AeroTech has never done anything to endanger its employees. It has always striven to run a safe, productive and innovative operation. With a little more time and patience, those operations will resume in the near future. |
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