Repercussions continue one decade after tragedy
PORT WENTWORTH, Ga. — Broken equipment inside a steel conveyor belt sparked the first explosion at the Imperial Sugar refinery in Port Wentworth on a mild winter night 10 years ago.
The initial blast rocked the building, jolting more dust into the air. And like so much tiny kindling, that dust ignited seconds later, creating a fireball visible miles away.
Eight workers died that night and six more eventually succumbed to their burns. Dozens of others were injured but survived, 14 of them spending months at the Joseph M. Still Burn Center in Augusta.
Those lives lost from the Feb. 7, 2008, tragedy were Eric Barnes, John Calvin Butler Jr., Truitt Byers, Alphonso Fields Sr., Michael Kelly Fields, Malcolm Frazier, McKinley “Von” Habersham Sr., Shelathia “Shon” Harvey, Earl Johnson, Patricia Ann “Pat” Lowe Proctor, Earl Quarterman, Byron Singleton, Tony Thomas and Michael “Big Mike” Williams.
Better housekeeping would have prevented any loss of life, a federal investigation determined.
The tragedy and its aftermath reached deep into the community, in part because it happened at a refinery that had been a major employer here since 1917 and where 121 people were working that night.
“Growing up here, who doesn’t know somebody from the Savannah sugar refinery?” said Savannah assistant fire chief William Handy, 45, a captain that February night in 2008. “You knew somebody who worked there or you knew somebody who knew somebody who worked there.”
The repercussions of the fire reflected those connections as the community waited first for bodies to be recovered, then for survivors to come home from the burn center, and finally, and in some cases in vain, for restitution, accountability and measures to prevent the next disaster.
Immediately after the fire, the federal U.S. Chemical Safety Board and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration investigated. Both inquiries found company officials knew for years about deadly hazards at the Port Wentworth site, but didn’t correct them.
The probes concluded that highly combustible sugar dust, which hung in the air and piled up knee-high in places, fueled the explosions and fire. OSHA issued 124 safety citations at Imperial, most of which the agency called “willful,” meaning the company acted with “plain indifference to, or intentional disregard for, employee safety and health.”
Imperial Sugar agreed in July 2010 to pay more than $4 million for safety violations at its Port Wentworth refinery as part of a company-wide $6 million settlement with regulators. It also accepted a three-year program of intensive OSHA oversight at its Port Wentworth refinery.
In the agreement, Imperial admitted no wrongdoing, but no longer contested OSHA’s citations.
OSHA did request that the office of U.S. Attorney Edward J. Tarver consider criminal charges, but Tarver announced in February 2013 that he would not pursue a prosecution of Imperial or any of its executives, citing insufficient evidence and a lack of a felony provision under the prevailing statute.