L&I issues $650K in fines after ag worker death in East Wenatchee

Washington State Department of Labor & Industries fined two central Washington companies a combined $650,000, the agency announced Wednesday, after a fruit storage worker died from asphyxiation inside a controlled-atmosphere room in October.

The worker for Pace International LLC was found unresponsive after spraying apples in a Stemilt Growers’ storage room in East Wenatchee in which the oxygen had been removed to help preserve the fruit. 

In an investigation, L&I found the worker from Pace entered the room without a safety monitor as required by law. A Stemilt employee also failed to warn the worker that his oxygen monitor alarm had sounded near the entry to the storage room, indicating the room lacked sufficient oxygen, according to L&I.

“Both companies own a piece of this preventable tragedy,” Craig Blackwood, assistant director for L&I’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, said in a news release, adding, “It’s a wonder that Pace hasn’t had a worker die before now. They’ve been gambling with workers’ lives for a long time and they finally lost.”

L&I also discovered Pace International’s training handbook allowed workers to enter controlled-atmosphere rooms with an oxygen level of just 17.5% despite state regulations requiring oxygen levels to be at 19.5% or higher.

L&I fined Pace $574,000 and Stemilt $76,300. Pace has appealed. The agency also placed Pace on its severe violator list for the eight willful and two serious violations the agency issued. 

The agency created the Severe Violator Enforcement Program to increase monitoring of companies that are “resistant or indifferent” to safety rules. A recent Cascade PBS analysis of L&I records found more than a third of severe violator companies had not received required follow-up inspections. 

Stemilt was also fined $2,700 in 2022 after two employees worked in a room that lacked sufficient oxygen without the use of oxygen monitors.