" ‘It Didn’t Have to Be This Way’: After Another Explosion at Clairton Coke Works, Advocates Call for Accountability", 15 August 2025

The deadly blast at the U.S. Steel facility outside Pittsburgh was just the latest in a series of recent workplace accidents.

...

The 2010 accident—which prompted multiple lawsuits against the company and left one worker with burns over 40 percent of his body and permanent disfigurement—is part of a troubling pattern at the 125-year-old Coke Works.

...

It was followed by a catastrophic fire in 2018, an explosion in February that injured two workers and, just this Monday, an explosion that killed two and injured at least 10. After touring Clairton in 2017, a county health official called it “one of the most decrepit facilities I’ve ever seen in my nearly 30 years of work.”

...

Environmental advocates say the company’s attitude toward maintenance is also reflected in longstanding pollution problems at the plant, which processes coal to make coke, a concentrated derivative that fuels steel manufacturing. In the last five years, U.S. Steel has paid more than $10 million in penalties for violations of the Clean Air Act at Clairton. The 2018 fire, which took down key pollution controls at the plant, resulted in a $42 million settlement for violations of that law.

...

A statement implying that working in the steel industry is inherently deadly “is something to expect from a politician in 1925,” not 2025, Mehalik said. “It is completely inappropriate to suggest that people should have to go to work in an environment where they might not come home that day.”

...

At a press conference this week, U.S. Steel CEO David Burritt said safety “is in our DNA” and vowed to “to get to the truth” of the accident’s cause. Burritt said he was “shocked and outraged” by a statement from a worker who said U.S. Steel’s approach to maintenance was not preventive but reactive. 

“We take this extraordinarily seriously,” he said. “Safety is and always will be our No. 1 priority, every shift, every day, every facility, always.”

...

Asked by Inside Climate News about the history of accidents at the plants, the company sent a statement about this week’s explosion. “We are working closely with relevant authorities to investigate the cause of the incident,” Burritt said.

...

After the 2010 blast, a lawsuit filed by injured workers alleged that the explosion was caused by “the gross and outrageous negligence of U.S. Steel,” arguing that the company had failed to provide adequate training for employees, failed to monitor for dangerous levels of gas and failed to ventilate the area properly. U.S. Steel had also “intentionally” ignored ringing alarms and told the workers to keep working rather than evacuate, the lawsuit contended. U.S. Steel denied the lawsuit’s claims, settling it for what the plaintiffs’ lawyer called a “significant” sum.

...

“We can absolutely be doing more to make these workplaces safer, both for workers and communities,” said Hilary Lewis, steel director at Industrious Labs, a nonprofit organization that advocates for decarbonizing heavy industry. 

Among the 10 coke plants still operating in the U.S., Clairton stands out, Lewis said. It is the largest and one of the oldest, as well as one of the state’s biggest sources of air pollution.