ASSOCIATED PRESS

August 2, 2008

State probing 12 possible worker heat deaths

By GARANCE BURKE,THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

FRESNO -- Labor officials said Friday they were investigating whether a rash of early-season heat waves had caused the deaths of a record number of California workers by summer's peak.

Despite an enforcement push to protect employees toiling in the searing conditions outdoors, 12 people have died of possible heat-related causes in the first seven months of this year alone, according to the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health.

Half of those victims were agricultural workers, several of whom died after harvesting grapes in the heat. Among them was 17-year-old Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez, who was overcome in May in a vineyard near Farmington.

The latest to fall was 38-year-old vineyard worker Jorge Herrera, who died Thursday after spending weeks in a Bakersfield hospital after his collapse on July 10.

"When a heat wave hits, people have to be aware that it can be a fatal hazard," said Dean Fryer, a spokesman for the division known as Cal-OSHA. "That is exactly what we have been hammering away all summer to employer groups and employee groups."

Health and safety inspectors have made dozens of spot and routine visits to fields and construction sites in the past two months, trying to root out employers who don't provide safe working conditions when temperatures soar.

Also, the agency has started giving farm labor contractors workshops on how to follow the state's heat rules, which require that workers have access to adequate water and shade.

Friday, the United Farm Workers cited Herrera's death as evidence that the state's regulations weren't enough to save lives, a charge labor authorities denied.

"This summer will be remembered as the black summer for farm workers," UFW President Arturo Rodriguez said in a statement.

"How many more must die or fall gravely ill before the governor realizes not enough is being done to protect farmworkers?"

The sun scorches farms in the central part of the state every summer, but this year's three heat waves came particularly early, and likely will be followed by another spell of high heat.

"We'll have another hot spell in August, I'm sure of it," said Michael Bingham, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

"Temperatures near 100 are normal at this time of the year."

Just two of the 12 deaths have been confirmed as heat-related so far. Those workers who didn't die laboring in agriculture perished on construction sites, in oil fields, while hauling chemicals and working at a warehouse.

Heat stroke also has claimed the lives of four Californians so far this year, including a 91- year-old Modesto woman whose air conditioning failed in her mobile home, according to the Governor's Office of Emergency Services.