For an excruciating 15 minutes, a Korean-speaking technician bled uncontrollably down his left thigh, caught on a conveyor belt that ripped the skin off his hand like a glove.
Medical responders described the horrific injuries the 40-year-old man suffered in the structure of Hyundai’s latest electric vehicle conglomerate: a crushed chest, a deformed hand and a mutilated leg. After an emergency airlift to Savannah Trauma Hospital, 30 miles away, they still didn’t know his name.
Three days later, on June 3, the site’s main company, Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America (HMGMA), issued a terse statement. One employee was treated for serious internal and external injuries and is in good condition. On June 5, the federal organization guilty of The agency that oversees the protection of offices completed an on-site inspection; However, more than two months later, he still hasn’t assigned any responsibility.
Since construction began in January 2023, HMGMA and six other Hyundai-affiliated plants have occupied 3,000 acres of deforested land just south of I-16 ahead of schedule. Hyundai officials say their goal is to get their first electric vehicle off the finish line to the finish line. of the year, in time for Hyundai cars made there to be eligible for customer incentives under the Biden administration’s 2024 Inflation Reduction Act.
The immediate speed of construction, however, comes at a cost to Georgia’s largest economic progress project, according to a former and current security official.
The two men, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals from Hyundai, have worked on other primary structure projects in the region. At the vast site of Ellabell, the protection criteria are among the worst they have experienced in their careers.
The organizational chaos forces, according to the former director, to stick to more productive protection practices and raises doubts about whether the dozens of companies affected by its structure respect the laws on the protection of offices.
The treadmill accident, the main points of which are being reported for the first time, is one of at least 20 traumatic injuries that the paint emergency force has responded to at the Hyundai site since painting began in January 2023 through May. 2024, according to EmergencyArrayand Firefighters. records received through The Current.
Thirteen of those injuries occurred in the first six months of 2024. Among them, two other people were injured in falls, two were hit in the head with devices, and four were involved in car accidents. Many required emergency airlift off-site. of them resulted in the death of a worker.
These serious injuries make up only a fraction of the total 911 calls from the site, according to documents reviewed by The Current, and exclude incidents such as those in which staff suffered heat exhaustion, stress-related injuries and non-injury car accidents.
However, at the same time, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) lists only 10 reports in its public database related to injuries that occurred between January 2023 and May 2024.
Under federal law, employers must report serious injuries or injuries to OSHA as soon as possible, and the company initiates a compliance inspection after receiving a report. It’s unclear what caused the discrepancy between the documented injuries and OSHA inspections.
The federal agency’s workplace in Savannah did not respond to several phone calls commenting on protection standards, its oversight of the dozens of Hyundai contractors and suppliers working at the production site and the number of injuries reported at the site.
OSHA’s database does not include any inspections for any of Hyundai’s seven on-site corporations, which are legally separate from others but will work together to produce Hyundai’s electric vehicles.
One such company, HMGMA, is colloquially known as “Metaplant” and is a newly formed entity under contract with Georgia to obtain $2. 1 billion in tax deferrals, subsidized structural costs and other benefits. In exchange, it has committed to creating 8,500 jobs. in collaboration with Hyundai’s other subsidiaries offered on the site.
But most of the staff building the site’s amenities are hired through a complex network of subcontractors and suppliers, a common business style that reduces the liability of a giant company.
OSHA imposed fines for office protection violations on two of those contractors who worked at HMGMA facilities at the Ellabell site. Louisiana-based Eastern Constructors Incorporated was ordered to pay more than $160,000, while Sungwon Georgia Corp. was fined $22,000. Both corporations are contesting the fines.
The only employee who died in the Array was working for Eastern Constructors, and the company no longer has a contract at theArray, according to HMGMA.
HMGMA told The Current in a statement that the company and its subsidiaries “adhere to strict safety criteria throughout the site. ”
HMGMA did not respond to a question about whether it tracks employee injuries sitewide.
All seven Hyundai plants are independently culpable for reporting structure employee injuries at their facilities to OSHA, HMGMA spokeswoman Bianca Johnson wrote. “HMGMA encourages you to submit reports in a timely manner, as needed,” she said. The Current reached out to all seven corporations and got a reaction from HMGMA.
“There is popular on-site guidance for all who enter the site, covering fundamental protective regulations for structural PPE, destination turn reporting strategies, and the availability of an on-site medical clinic,” Johnson wrote. “There is also a weekly meeting of the protection team with all affiliates to share reports of injuries, problems found/fixed, and more productive practices. HMGMA also has an on-site emergency reaction team trained in medical, fire and spill reaction.
The former protection manager who worked in the organization’s HMGMA component told The Current that there were several days when the manager saw staff without critical protective devices such as helmets, protective gear, or proper footwear. The security briefing, the official said, lasted only a few minutes.
The speed of the cadres created “an atmosphere of frustration,” according to the former manager.
“All the time I ask myself ‘what have I gotten myself into,'” the former security official said. “Chaotic would be an understatement. “
The details of almost all of the traumatic incidents that have occurred have never been made public. The following are descriptions of various incidents documented by rescue personnel and firefighters, and told to The Current through eyewitness employees.
“The drop was about 60 feet”
In the first reported injury and only death shown in the Array structure, employee Victor Javier Gamboa lost his balance while on a metal beam on the third floor of the unfinished paint shop in the HMGMA structure on April 29, 2023.
Gamboa, a contractor hired through Eastern Constructors, took the work to his five children and fiancée in Statesboro.
When assistance arrived, he was lying on his back, unconscious and unconscious, his seat belt unfastened around his waist. It carried a cord, a piece of thread designed to catch the wearer in the event of a fall. But as he fell, a metal beam cut the cable, leaving Gamboa to sink 20 meters above the ground. Workers who saw the twist of fate told EMS that Gamboa hit a lower beam as he fell.
Emergency doctors tried to classify him, but they couldn’t save him. Gamboa was pronounced dead and care of his body was turned over to the Bryan County coroner an hour and 42 minutes after the emergency arrived at the scene.
OSHA investigated Eastern Constructors, and the company found that the company committed a serious and willful violation of the hard work law. This ruling represents the ultimate serious violation OSHA can impose, announcing that the employer intentionally ignored OSHA’s protective rules and regulations and failed to protect the worker. employee.
OSHA fined Eastern Constructors more than $160,000 after discovering that the defective lifebuoy could not deal with sharp edges as intended. According to OSHA, Eastern Constructors failed to comply with required protective protocols, such as examining life-saving appliances before each use and allowing Gamboa to use a protective harness that was defective and showed “noticeable signs of damage and deterioration. ”
The firm also added the contractor to its Severe Offender Enforcement Program, a list of employers who demonstrate repeated disregard for their legal responsibility to provide a healthy office for their employees.
In November, Eastern Constructors challenged the fine. The OSHA case remains open, and the investigation documents will not be made public until the case is closed.
As a result of OSHA’s decision, HMGMA announced that it would end its collaboration with Eastern Constructors. HMGMA reported on August 8 that the company had been removed from the site.
“Important in contact and care of patients”
Rescue personnel airlifted another injured employee from the structure site on Feb. 16, 2024, after he fell 15 to 20 feet from a platform, according to emergency medical reports.
But first, doctors had to treat the injured employee at the 3,000-acre site.
When the emergency reached the main security building, there was no one there to advise them through the vast site to the patient. No one at the safety workplace was aware of the incident, firefighters present at the scene wrote in their report.
The crew was halfway through the construction of the main meeting when a white Dodge Ram beckoned them over and showed them the warehouse where the injured employee was located. However, the firefighters reported that “it was evident that the user who was driving us did not know where the patient Array was”.
Finally, after the sounds of “shaking”, the doctors discovered the employee lying on his back in a “state of stupor”, almost unconscious, according to the emergency medical report. He was surrounded by between 20 and 30 employees of the structure, dripping with blood. from the back of the head and left ear.
During the worker’s evaluation, EMS discovered no symptoms of a protective harness.
According to the Emergency Medical Service report, the warehouse where doctors discovered the injured man was too narrow for the ambulance and its team to provide maximum effective care.
While the doctors were working, the hospital staff approached the first responders.
As EMS strapped and strapped the injured man to the panel and stretcher, those workers surrounded him, yelling at them to hurry up and looking to touch the patient as the EMS team tried to “complete the proper life-sustaining treatment. “
Once in the ambulance, EMS reported that “several site staff members were taken to the ambulance and had to be asked to leave repeatedly. “Emergency medical services allowed a “friend/colleague” to board the ambulance to translate for the patient.
“All of the things listed above have a significant impact on patient contact and care,” the EMS officer wrote.
The injured employee was transferred to a LifeStar emergency helicopter and taken to Memorial Health University Medical Center in Savannah.
Emergency and fire reports reviewed through The Current omitted the injured worker’s call for privacy reasons. The documents do not imply where he worked. None of the Hyundai subsidiaries there have publicly shown the injury.
OSHA records show the company opened an inspection into an incident involving a fall at an HMGMA assembly construction site on Feb. 21. However, because the OSHA case is still open, it is unclear if this OSHA case is a reaction to the February 16 case. incident detailed through reports of EMS. La only time before Feb. 21 that first responders provided care following a fall at the Hyundai site in September 2023.
In the Feb. 21 case, OSHA found that contractor Sungwon Georgia Corp. He had committed two serious violations and fined the company $22,000 for exposing himself to a fall hazard from 15 feet without an anchored fall arrest system.
Sungwon appealed the fine and the case remains open. The Current attempted to reach Sungwon, but the company did not respond.
HMGMA did not respond to a question from The Current about whether it still had a contract with Sungwon Georgia Corp.
“The patient taken to traumatology 1”
Two other personnel fell and were injured on Sept. 23, 2023, and March 21, 2024, according to EMS records. First responders found one man lying face down after falling from a crane, and the other suffered an “obviously” damaged arm after being hit. thrown from an elevator 30 feet high. Emergency medical services took the injured personnel to Memorial Hospital for treatment.
No incident dates appear in OSHA inspection data, and OSHA does not report any on-site inspections within one month of the injury. It is not known which subcontractor hired those men.
A further five traumatic injuries occurred in cases recorded through the emergency and chimney in which staff were struck by heavy objects. In October 2023, for example, a metal beam cut deeply into an employee’s shin. In another incident, in December 2023, a metal lightning struck an employee and maimed his leg.
In January, an employee was hit between the eyes with a steel pipe while running in an elevator basket. When assistance arrived, his limbs were numb and immobile after falling backwards into the basket.
In December 2023, one worker’s leg was crushed by a forklift, and in February 2024, another’s foot was crushed by a scissor lift.
The identities of those personnel were redacted from emergency medical and fire branch records reviewed by The Current. OSHA’s inspection database does not show records of on-site inspections in the week following those accidents.
“The device immobilized the patient. “
By the end of May, structural paints at Hyundai GLOVIS, the site’s logistics provider, had advanced enough to install and test a conveyor belt.
A 40-year-old Korean-speaking employee hired through SFA Engineering Corp. , a South Korean manufacturer of advertising equipment, is a component of the team blamed for wearing down the work.
On May 31, while the technician was working, the machinery suddenly started up. We still don’t know how or why. OSHA has not made public about the incident.
A rumor quickly spread that a guy was trapped in the jaws of the machine.
A 911 official rushed to the scene to request emergency medical help.
First aid arrived 15 minutes later. They reported that the technician was lying on his left side, trapped between two parts of the machine, and that he lost consciousness on several occasions.
The guy was bleeding uncontrollably from his left thigh, where the device had ripped the flesh from his bones. His right hand was “deformed” and his skin was torn away, exposing the mutilated bones, tendons and muscles beneath him.
“What’s his name?” How old is he?” a rescuer shouted. He later wrote in his report that he did not perceive the personnel surrounding the victim, because most of them spoke Korean.
First responders placed two high, tight tourniquets on his leg and arm, slowing the bleeding until a Bryan County fire crew removed his body from the machine.
The man’s chest was crushed and in all likelihood he was suffering from a collapsed lung, the EMS team told the 911 operator. Paramedics stuck a decompression needle into the technician’s chest, listening to see if air escaped through the catheter.
After 37 minutes of on-site triage, a LifeStar helicopter arrived and transported him to Memorial Hospital, the nearest Level 1 trauma center.
There, the hospital admitted him with a trauma name, a mixture of phonetic letters randomly selected to differentiate him from the other John Does in the Memorial Hospital emergency room.
The airlift passed without authorization, but neither Hyundai Metaplant nor Hyundai GLOVIS disclosed the main points of the accident.
On June 3, HMGMA released a guy from Array One who was treated for serious internal and external injuries and is in good condition, he said.
The cause of the injury, he added, is still being investigated.
OSHA’s public documentation of the May 31 accident is sparse. OSHA classified the treadmill injury as an “amputation. ” The agency’s Savannah completed the on-site portion of the inspection on June 5.
HMGMA and Hyundai GLOVIS cooperated together on OSHA’s investigation, the company told The Current. The GLOVIS factory halted work as soon as the incident was reported, the company said.
However, two months later, OSHA imposed violations or fines on the subcontractor. HMGMA showed The Current that the technician is still receiving medical attention.
Although HMGMA cut ties with Eastern Constructors Incorporated after Gamboa’s death, the company declined to say whether other subcontractors involved in traumatic employee injuries were kicked off the site or reprimanded in any way. any.
This story provided through WABE’s content, The Current.
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