Communicating Issues Fatality Report

2014 – DuPont LA Porte Toxic Chemical Leak Nearly 24,000 pounds of the toxic chemical, methyl mercaptan, was released after a series of shift communication mistakes. The U.S. Chemical Safety Board investigation reported that the errors began five days previous to the incident. DuPont was fined $372,000 for safety violations at the LaPorte plant and The Occupational Safety and Health Administration put the company in it’s “Severe Violator Enforcement Program. Four employees were killed as a result of the leak.

2013 – Kiwi Rail Train Derailment Poor communication during an overnight shift change led to a Wellington-bound train carriage derailing. The Transport Accident Investigation Commission in New Zealand investigation found that 10 weeks before the derailment, maintenance staff had forgotten to fit split pins to bolts that held the part in place that caused the derailment. Employees were not given the proper instructions to follow and the repair task was left out. Four passengers were injured as a result.

2010 – BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Due to a lack of appropriately analyzing all the information on hand, BP made several poor decisions that lead to the Macondo well blowout. According to the BOEMRE and the US Coast Guard’s reports, BP failed to share critical information from their onshore staff as well as reports from Halliburton, their drilling partner, to the Deep Water Horizon rig crew which lead to the incident. Sadly, eleven men lost their lives due to this communication failure and almost five million barrels o oil was discharged in the Gulf of Mexico.