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Subscribe to RSSTAIPEI - A chlorine gas leak at an Apple Inc. supplier's Chinese plant killed one person and left four others in comas, Xinhua Net reported late on Thursday.
Catcher Technology confirmed that an incident at its factory in Suzhou, eastern China, had caused injuries.
Xinhua reported the gas leak occurred during waste water processing.
Read more China coverage in our Behind The Wall blog
"It has nothing to do with our production or material used," James Wu, Catcher's vice president of corporate finance, told Reuters. "It happened when a contractor was processing waste; it was routine work. We are currently trying to understand what has gone wrong."
Wu did not confirm the number of the casualties or the nature of their injuries.
Worker at Apple supplier: 'We're humans, we're not machines'
The company later issued a statement, saying the accident involved five workers, though it also did not detail the nature of any injuries.
"The accident happened at the waste disposal facility and is not directly related to any manufacturing process, factory, or materials. This is also a single and isolated event," the statement said.
Worker suicide at Chinese plant of Apple supplier
Last October, a separate Catcher plant in Suzhou was ordered closed for a time because of complaints from nearby residents about strong odors from gas emissions.
Catcher Technology supplies metal casings for Apple Inc. and Dell Inc., the Wall Street Journal reported.
The newspaper added:
China-based suppliers of electronic components for global brands have been under scrutiny in recent years following a spate of industrial accidents, pollution charges and employee suicides.
In one example of how international firms have addressed such issues, Apple is working with major supplier Foxconn Technology Group, which makes iPhones and iPads, to improve conditions at its factories in China after an audit report found excessive working hours and health and safety issues there.
Go Figure: Foxconn, Apple's primary supplier in China, is under heat for dismal working conditions for employees. Melissa Harris-Perry tallies up the list of Foxconn's infractions and how they factor into Apple's record profits.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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Leave a Comment:
In 2010, there were 4,690 occupational deaths in the US, or 12.8 per day. How about we pay attention to those?
I heard it was corporate sabotage. I also heard a rival escaped with something. Anyone at the org care to elaborate on what it was? Hmm. ; ]
Cheers
Now they know why the chlorine gets added to the water.
And they say it is the 1% who take the risks. Workers risk their lives, the 1% only risk money.
How long before they have those lawyers on TV, screaming in Chinese "if you have been diagnosed with Mesothelioma" compensation may be available through a lawsuit against APPLE.
Everyone relax. Industrial accidents happen every day in every country. The only reason this made it on the news is the fact that they could toss "Apple" into the headline and generate some clicks for ad revenue. Just look at the comments below mine to see people responding exactly as the NBC news marketing department predicted they would.
Gotta love how MSNBC has to inset 'Apple' in the headline to generate any interest in the story.
This has nothing to do with Apple.
New outlets are getting sadder and sadder with their deceptive journalism.
Soon we'll see headlines like...
"Starbucks visited by Apple, Inc employees robbed"
"Truck driver delivering Apple iPads causes 5 car accident"
"Cargo Ship caring Apple products sinks"
So, cheap labor for US products in China... this speaks volumes to the working conditions those people have to endure to produce Apple products. Shame on you Apple. I will never buy anything you make, specifically because you use slave labor in attrocious conditions to assemble your products. How many people have to die, how many protests must there be before you figure out that you and all the other American companies employing Chinese labor are complicit in how these people have to live. Better that they scratch out a meager existence on a hard-scsrabble farm than endure the indentured servatude that exists in these mega-factories, or worse yet, givve up their lives so you can make your mega-profits. Your iPod, iPhone, iPad and MacBook are coated in Chinese blood. COrporatye American greed at its finest.
How does an industrial accident "speak volumes" about working conditions? This incident occurred at their waste treatment facility, not on a production line:
"It has nothing to do with our production or material used," James Wu, Catcher's vice president of corporate finance, told Reuters. "It happened when a contractor was processing waste; it was routine work."
As was pointed out by a previous poster, there were almost 13 occupational deaths a day in the US in 2010. So is making products in America "American greed at its finest"?
You go on this rant about not wanting to buy Apple products, apparently singling them out for blame, while you acknowledge there are a great number of American companies that use Chinese manufacturing facilities, including, no doubt, the maker of the computer you are using, the shirt you are wearing, or any number of household products. Products you bought probably by comparing the price, and choosing the "best deal".
"Better that they scratch out a meager existence on a hard-scsrabble (sic) farm than endure the indentured servatude (sic) that exists in these mega-factories"
Wow. Who are you to make that judgement? Tens of thousands of rural Chinese disagree with you. Why don't you go "scratch out a meager existence on a hard-scrabble farm" for a while and see if you still feel the same way.
Chlorine gas is a terrible way to go. You essentially drown in your own phlegm.
And so glad those corporations outsource those HOURLY wage, factory POLLUTING jobs to foreign countries.......We have The DOL, EPA, OSHA & the right to form unions. They're not entirely useless.
I would suggest that the news media and others in our government check out our own history on how bad the workers in this country have been treated in the past, you got it brothers and sisters not good you can bet on that. The very reason we had to start unions in this country to protect the workers from the greedy over lords that own the politicians that are supposed to represent all the people and not just their greedy rich friends that put them in office. I say before you go to wailing on what China does clean up your house first, and always know by history all countries that grow and become powerful all treat their citizens bad and actually work their workers to death by putting them in danger at work and at home if they live close to the ugly place where they work. I would just mention for all to take a look at where the working class in this country are right now, yep you know we are all bankrupt thanks to the greed of the rich and powerful and our so called representation in our congress.
Chlorine gas when you breath it you just drank down a cup of clorox bleach nice !
The workers were told to work around the dead guy so it's not really a problem for Apple.
It will take a long time but American Manufactures in China are getting away with a lot that they wouldn't be able to do here. We have Laws and OSHA. I know most everyone says Union is a dirty word but they to effect Safty Regulations. I don't think China has much in the way of Saftey Regulations.
I wouldn't say that Union is a dirty word. They were very important to improving our labor laws and conditions. The problem that people have with Unions is that they aren't as relevant as they once were, but they still try to flex their muscle and often end up doing more harm than good these days.
My opinions of Unions is that they work well when they are small local unions, but once they get big they become a business onto themselves and are more concerned with the business of the Union than taking care of the worker.
But otherwise, I would say that you are correct. Companies go to China because the workers have little to no rights and they can do pretty much anything they want in pursuit of profit.
This will only stop when companies start bringing their factories back to America and China starts losing money. No money hurts the government and then they will enforce better laws for workers.
The problem with your argument is that companies will not bring jobs back to the U.S. as long as they can make a larger profit by taking advantage of the lax labor laws in these other countries and shipping the products back here to be sold.
All in the name of the all mighty dollar.
oldman, I think you're digging back a bit far in the U.S. industrial past. We have "cleaned up" our act since those times. Yes, we still have industrial accidents (mining, etc.) but, on the whole, we've done a pretty good job.
Yes, it has been some time since a river caught on fire in the United States.
I'm very sorry to hear about such an unfortunate incident, and I hope people at that factory are able to pick up the pieces and go on. The iPhone 5 I pre-ordered had better arrive without any manufacturing delays.
It better not cause any delays in my Macbook shipment, It's just some gas fumes nothing to worry about.
Slaver Apple strikes again
maybe we should make them in the USA??? dam there obscene profits...i'll never own one of there products....
LOL. Didnt take long until the MORONS came out in full force on this forum to down Apple. Even though this company is NOT owned by APPLE and is absolutely NO different than any other chinese company sub-contracted by every single American Manufacturer, somehow, miraculously, this becomes Apples fault. People, seriously. Get a life. Or better yet, just quit commenting on Apple products and articles. I mean, after all, none of you "will ever buy (fill in the Apple product name here) ever again" anyway. Sounds like a the jealous lover syndrome to me, paying more attention to a company that "jilted" you in some way. Lol what a joke.
Lol.. All IFags are worried of Apple bashing. Ibutt hurt level = 4.
Oh wow. NBC, of course, will try to confuse readers by using only one of the world's recognizable companies in their headline. FOXCONN, which is NOT OWNED by Apple, is responsible for the welfare of their OWN employees. Foxconn also have manufacturing contracts with other well-known multinational companies like Dell and Sony.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn
Please NBC, why derail on one company and keep others invisible? The point is to bring back jobs to the United States, not to make misleading headlines to capture readers' attention.
Actually the article also points out that this company contracts for Dell.
Typical Chinese mindset..."This is an isolated incident and ONLY ONE person died -- the rest are still breathing -- sort of." What else happens like this in the industrial world that the public never hears of? A diamond mine in Africa that runs 3 shifts, 1000 workers each shift, 24 hours per day brags they have only one fatality for every 23,000 man hours. That literally means they average one death per day at that mine, but nobody reports THAT on the news because of the power of the diamond cartels!
I buy American Products - LOL!
LMAO, I buy American products too, I just bought a new Toyota.
Lots of blame to go around here. But the larger issue is China's institutional disregard for human and worker rights. A nation of well over a billion people is not easily compelled to value the individual. National pride is measured in terms of economic output and how close they perceive themselves to be a superpower on the world stage. An enormous and ready supply of labor leads to the real but unspoken truth that the individual worker is disposable. Move the bodies, clean up the mess and get back to work. There's plenty more where they came from. Its hard to imagine that this will ever change.
I worked during the summers while in college for a major us forest products plant. A chlorine flow meter with 1 inch thick glass burst and liquid chlorine ran all over the floor. It was on the roof of a 7 story building with thousands of people living nearby.
A very brave worker thru something over himself and went out and turned off the valve to stop the flow.
I got to go up and help with the cleanup. Neither the fire department nor any other emergency services were called.
The chlorine was used to bleach the pulp, and was pumped directly from a tank car thru a 3/4 inch plastic pipe up the outside of the building to the roof. That pipe also managed to burst one day, and the chlorine in it ran out and evaporated into the air. Once again, good luck followed bad, because a new tank car had been pulled in, but wasn't connected yet, so just what was in the pipe escaped.
As I recall, lots of workers lost the paint on their cars, but it did not drift far enough to affect residents.
No people were injured in either incident, probably because everyone went thru periodical training on the dangers of the many chemicals, and respirators and oxygen back packs were stationedaround. You were required to wear a respirator when in one of the plants with nasty gasses and liquids.
I had an industrial accident,thanks to the rules in place,my company paid for all the hospital bill,State paid for a prosthetic arm, I will be able to have my prosthetic arm repaired for the rest of my life.UNION WORKER,UNION CONTRACT,Americans with Disabilities Act 1993.So the companies move work off shore,no safety rules no liability when someone gets hurt or killed.And so it goes.
"here's your sign"
let's keep using China to manufacture our products, and instead of employing American's we pay the Chinese Foxconn who pays their people sweat shop labor wages and horrible working conditions. But we need to have our products made by the lowest bidder so that Apple and these other guys can continue to post record profits ??
Instead of not making such a huge profit margin, how about creating jobs for Americans, creating more economy here locally, rather than this kind of crap happening.
And yeah yeah I've heard the argument a hundred times "but they can't afford to manufacture in USA because the horrible taxes and fees that our local and federal governements impose make it impossible" - BULLS&#T !!
It can happen, and it does, these companies just want to make the best profit margin possible and are watching the bottom line and that is all these big companies care about.
how about all the foreign vehicle manufactures that have plants in the USA, like Toyota, BMW just to name a few, how can they do it then ?????
this is an invalid argument, and people need to stop giving in to that junk.
a little help from our government administration wouldn't hurt either, more tax breaks for domestic manufacture companies and grants to build plants etc.
KEEP IT HERE !!!!!!!!
I always love how every time an article like this comes out Apple states that they are working to improve worker safety in China. I'm sure they'll say the same thing the next time someone over there dies to lax worker safety and the next time and the next time.....
Companies go to China for two reasons. Cheap labor and a lack of worker safety and pollution laws. Those things cost money. It is just easier to say that you are working on the problem when someone dies and keep doing business as usual. We all want our cheap iPhones.
My uncle was seriously injured after a chlorine leak at a water treatment plant in Virginia. A tank tipped over and the valve sprung a leak. The only reason the China incident is making news is because they can mention Apple in the story.
James5678,
the only reason this is in the news is because nbc, picked the tidbit from the china news agency.. working conditions in China are far better than they used to be, before the internet.
the outsourcing of jobs has its headaches and consequences, just ask Mitt Romney
These irate people aren't business friendly, so they don't realize the point for the Real Americans, is to have US working conditions be as much like those in China as possible. It's time for the 10 people who are the New American Majority to run ominous sounding political ads about how the Administration's unnecessary emphasis on safety is getting us behind the Chinese, where safety doesn't matter at all.
Typical Chinese mindset..."This is an isolated incident and ONLY ONE person died -- the rest are still breathing -- sort of." What else happens like this in the industrial world that the public never hears of? A diamond mine in Africa that runs 3 shifts, 1000 workers each shift, 24 hours per day brags they have only one fatality for every 23,000 man hours. That literally means they average one death per day at that mine, but nobody reports THAT on the news because of the power of the diamond cartels!@mathuin, My brother Brian showed me how to make some extra $ for me and for my family... All i did was, follow the steps explained on this webpage
Isn't it strange or realistic, that corporate profits trump safety? Public awareness kept at a minimum until they smell or sense something inherently dangerous in the air? The cover ups continue as profits teem in the billions of dollars while, as someone remarked, the workers risk their lives and the profiteers take home the really fat slabs of bacon.
Steve Jobs was a whore. He sold out the USAA and brought 250,000 jobs to China, all to keep investors happy and maintain his over sized ego. This failure as a human being reaped massive profits while undermining and underappreciating and under investing in the USA - his home. To make him an icon is very much like making Tom DeLay an american hero. Both were crooks, and prove the old proverb - every fortune starts with a crime.