At SpaceX, worker injuries soar — Reuters documented at least 600 previously unreported workplace injuries at rocket company: crushed limbs, amputations, electrocutions, head and eye wounds, and on…::Reuters documented more than 600 workplace injuries at SpaceX. Employees say they’re paying the price for Elon Musk’s push to reach Mars at breakneck speed.
You must log in or # to comment.
It was hardly the last serious accident at SpaceX. Since LeBlanc’s death in June 2014, which hasn’t been previously reported, Musk’s rocket company has disregarded worker-safety regulations and standard practices at its inherently dangerous rocket and satellite facilities nationwide, with workers paying a heavy price, a Reuters investigation found. Through interviews and government records, the news organization documented at least 600 injuries of SpaceX workers since 2014.
Many were serious or disabling. The records included reports of more than 100 workers suffering cuts or lacerations, 29 with broken bones or dislocations, 17 whose hands or fingers were “crushed,” and nine with head injuries, including one skull fracture, four concussions and one traumatic brain injury. The cases also included five burns, five electrocutions, eight accidents that led to amputations, 12 injuries involving multiple unspecified body parts, and seven workers with eye injuries. Others were relatively minor, including more than 170 reports of strains or sprains.
Holy shit… So what does the Muskrat have to say about this?
Musk himself at times appeared cavalier about safety on visits to SpaceX sites: Four employees said he sometimes played with a novelty flamethrower and discouraged workers from wearing safety yellow because he dislikes bright colors.
Jesus fucking christ. This man is such a caricature of an evil capitalist villain.
Really went from me being like “haha, funny evil capitalist caricature for comedy sake, but this is obviously exaggerated” as a teen to… Well… this. Not to mention oil barons literally putting our future at risk.
I seriously don’t get how some people can be such caricatures. It’s like they’re almost intentionally being evil, even when it’s counter to logic or profit.
But it isn’t counter to logic or profit.
If other people don’t play into what you care about, then they aren’t included in the logical equation. The only goal is personal profit.
And there are some counter examples, but generally CEOs of big companies like this make a shit ton of money. Personal profit. If the company goes under, it doesn’t matter because they’ve made their personal profit.
Shirking safety isn’t conductive to profit though. If am employee dies it doesn’t benefit you. Even if you literally have zero empathy and only care about the bottom line.
A dead employee may cost less than the safety measures that would have protected them.
The truth is that the belief that the caricature was exaggerated is simply PR. They’re actually just as evil as people made them out to be, not less.
Yeah, the older I get the more true this seems.
Which honestly is fucking bonkers to me. This is seriously who we’re letting run the world?
He thinks he’s cool, Gen X crystal pepsi cool.
Hey now, no need to get too crazy here.
This shows that he not only is willing to risk his employees safety for the sake of a “greater good” or at least a profitable business. But the fact that he not only ignores safety practices but actively removes those that are already in place just because they don’t please him aesthetically and he doesn’t want to see them is a whole other level of egoism and carelessness. He really doesn’t give a damn about other people
He’s a man baby, he doesn’t give a fuck about anyone but himself and his own ambition. He thinks paying people means you own them, he’ll just lie and bs his was to more VC money over and over and get what he wants because no matter what, he’s regarded as some kind of ‘genius’
He should be held to account, but won’t.
What did the UN pin the value of a human life at in US dollars? In that sense the ultra wealthy can literally afford death and other workplace accidents.
It’s disgusting, but I can totally see some rich chucklefucks viewing this through that lens.
Back in the day, deaths used to be openly priced into large projects. Freakonomics did an interesting cost analysis on the value of human life using highway speeds vs productivity lost reducing those speeds to save lives. Probably not overly accurate but it was alarmingly low.
These numbers mean nothing without a reference to compare with other similar industries. The article does include a number from other rocket manufacturers(?), though I’d be curious to see how it compares to other private companies, not, like, nasa, haha
Why not NASA? I hope you aren’t implying that private industry should be held to a lower safety standard than government
Not necessarily, but also government spends an inordinate amount of money on extra processes and moves much slower, which could naturally lead to fewer accidents because they’re just doing less, and also the government outsources quite a lot of labor which could include the more accident-prone aspects
It’s starting to sound like they should unionize
I’m gonna be that guy.
Electrocution kills you. Its in the name. I assume based on context they didn’t die.
What’s the appropriate name for an electricity injury?
The medical term is “Shocked really fucking badly”
I would guess an electric shock? Which doesn’t sound as bad as it should, but it should also include the level of burns incurred and if they suffered cardiac arrest or similar.
For example, the employee suffered electric shock from the unsecured 480v power line resulting in second degree burns to their arms and back and were resuscitated after suffering cardiac arrest.
You just described electrocution with way too many words.
Electrocution. OP is wrong, electrocution doesn’t necessarily requires that the person dies. Any severe injury by electric shock is also electrocution. The word might come from the method of executing dead penalties on convicts but it’s not a hard definition.
I suppose “shocked” or “received electrical burns”?
I’ll be that person too: word meanings change, journalists aren’t perfect, and “electrocution” likely had fewer characters than a suitable alternative
Good old Gilded Age again where Uber-wealthy
RailRocketry Barons sacrifice workers to speed along progress and profits.“reach Mars at breakneck speed” - great choice of words there.
deleted by creator
