Amazon told lawmakers it wouldn't build storm shelters in warehouses after fatal collapse

Amazon said it won't physique tempest shelters successful its warehouses aft a tornado ripped done 1 of its Illinois facilities much than a twelvemonth ago, sidesplitting six workers.

"Amazon requires that its buildings travel each applicable laws and gathering codes," Brian Huseman, Amazon's vice president of nationalist policy, wrote connected Jan. 14 successful responses to an enquiry from 3 Democratic senators.

"We person not identified immoderate jurisdiction successful the United States that requires tempest shelters oregon harmless rooms for these types of facilities," Huseman added successful the responses, which were obtained by CNBC.

In December 2021, an Amazon warehouse successful Edwardsville, Illinois, was severely damaged aft a almighty tornado tore done the facility, causing the 1.1 million-square-foot building's extortion to collapse, portion 40-foot-tall, 11-inch heavy walls connected the sides of the gathering fell inward. Six workers were killed, astir of whom were contracted transportation drivers.

Lawmakers including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Cori Bush, D-Mo., wrote to Amazon successful precocious December, seeking much accusation astir Amazon's plans to rebuild the Edwardsville warehouse, and questioning wherefore it didn't person a tempest structure oregon harmless country connected site.

Amazon said successful its responses that it follows guidelines from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the National Weather Service, and volition proceed to support a terrible upwind assembly country for workers to shelter-in-place.

OSHA guidelines accidental that basements, tempest cellars oregon tiny interior rooms supply the champion extortion from a tornado. But the national authorities doesn't necessitate specially built tempest shelters successful warehouses.

All the employees and contractors who died successful the illness were hiding successful a bathroom, portion others who sheltered successful a designated assembly country survived.

Amazon antecedently said it followed national guidance to archer employees to instrumentality structure instantly aft determination was a tornado warning. The tornado apt formed successful the facility's parking lot, and struck the gathering minutes aft a tempest informing was issued, the institution said.

OSHA completed an probe of the incidental last April, and the bureau didn't levy immoderate fines oregon penalties against Amazon, beyond ordering it to reappraisal its terrible upwind policies.

In their December missive addressed to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, lawmakers said the institution failed to adequately support workers astatine the Edwardsville installation and took contented with the country wherever employees were instructed to question structure during the storm.

"Amazon's evident unwillingness to put successful a tempest structure oregon harmless country astatine its Edwardsville installation is made adjacent much concerning by the information that installing 1 could beryllium done by Amazon astatine comparatively debased cost," they wrote, adding that the outgo of doing truthful would beryllium "negligible" for the company.

Amazon is simply a tenant astatine the warehouse and the proprietor is required to reconstruct the installation to its pre-tornado condition, institution spokesperson Kelly Nantel told KYTV, the NBC affiliate successful Springfield, Missouri.

In the aftermath of the tornado, Amazon has hired a meteorologist, created caller exigency badge cards informing workers of evacuation points and assembly areas, and launched an interior halfway for monitoring and communicating terrible upwind events, among different measures.

The families of 2 employees killed successful the gathering illness person filed wrongful decease lawsuits against Amazon and the companies that built the warehouse.

Reconstruction of the Edwardsville warehouse began successful June, according to KSDK, the NBC affiliate successful St. Louis, Missouri.