One man killed and another injured by an explosion at plant. A catalytic unit explodes, killing one worker and injuring two. At this plant, the 12-hour shift began in August 1998, and four major accidents have occurred in the last six months. When companies downsize they assign more work to fewer people and attempt to train them for health and safety as they perform their work. In a rational society, refinery workers would not work longer hours, they would work shorter hours.
Alert workers can prevent accidents.
It is in the common interest of the oil workers and the surrounding community that the workday be shortened, without cutting the pay. A shorter work week would also provide jobs to the community. Accidents and death are factored into production like casualties of war. The people who live near refineries are also casualties of this production of profits, pestilence and death. The Tosco refinery, along with many other refineries in California's Contra Costa County, have been constantly criticized by environmental groups throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.