Union Carbide to Pay $408,500 Fine to Settle Health, Safety Violations

Union Carbide Corp. agreed Friday to pay a record $408,500 fine to settle hundreds of contested health and safety violations, including allegations that it exposed unprotected workers to deadly gases, at two chemical plants in West Virginia.

The Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration said the agreement settles 556 alleged violations filed against the chemical giant last year after inspections of its Institute and South Charleston, W.Va., chemical plants.

OSHA originally had sought $1,377,300 in fines for 221 violations, including 127 described as “willful” or deliberate disregard of the law, at the Institute plant and $90,000 for 335 “willful” violations at South Charleston.

Terry Mikelson, a spokesman for the agency, said the settlement agreement includes the “standard non-admission clause in which the company accepts responsibility but does not admit guilt.”

Mikelson said the “willful” characterization by OSHA of the violations stands as part of the agreement, including one for what inspectors said was a requirement by officials at the Institute plant that workers “sniff” for the presence of deadly phosgene gas when alarms indicated a leak of it.

“They used to use canaries for that,” Labor Secretary William E. Brock said when the first set of citations was issued in April, 1986, accusing the company of blatantly violating safeguards to protect workers.

Phosgene was a major ingredient of mustard gas blamed for 1 million deaths when used as a weapon during World War I.