Rivian plant workers report safety issues causing injuries, crushed/broken limbs, faulty sensors... Anyone remember the film Christine?

[atebit]

RJ never should’ve left the old neighborhood.

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[Donald Stanfield]

This sounds like UAW smear campaign stuff to strong-arm Rivian into allowing the union.

 

[popoga]

Bloomberg is a bit of a rag these days, they seem to have a lot of axes that need grinding, and have had some high profile retractions recently. That said, any safety issues are critical. I'd love to see the rivian employees unionize on their own, and steer clear of the - imo - compromized UAW. IWW or IBEW or similar can lend expertise or something as needed, maybe.

 

[crashmtb]

This sounds like UAW smear campaign stuff to strong-arm Rivian into allowing the union.

UAW/CAW are the most useless union, they do nothing for their membership

 

[Donald Stanfield]

UAW/CAW are the most useless union, they do nothing for their membership

They are more a political organization than they are for their members.

 

[Zoidz]

I've been in dozens of factories over the years and have seen the good, the bad and the terrible regarding safety - on BOTH sides of the equation, company perspective and employee perspective. I'm not defending Rivian, I have no idea what they have or haven't done, but consider a few things:
- All of these complaints apparently were reported in the past few months with the encouragement of the UAW.
- It says that not all were alleged safety violations, some were safety "concerns"
- An accident/injury in a factory does not automatically mean there was a safety violation with the company at fault. Employees frequently ignore safety standards/procedures. Unfortunately, accidents do happen due to equipment breakage. That in and of itself is not an OSHA violation. Keep in mind that OSHA's stated mandate is

"Employers MUST provide their workers with a workplace that does not have serious hazards and must follow all OSHA safety and health standards. "

Here's a first hand example. An OSHA inspector arrived at one of my businesses due to an employee filing 5 alleged violations. After the inspection, the inspector told me he suspected before he even came out that none of them were violations but by law he had to come on site and investigate. The issue was that it was a young new production employee who never worked in a beverage processing facility. He thought that wet, slippery floors due to trace amounts of beverage product on the floor was a safety violation, and transfer hoses across the floor was tripping hazard safety violation. It isn't, it's a normal part of working in a beverage factory.... and in fact he was contributing to the slippery floors himself by not cleaning up frequently and thoroughly. The inspector told me they get more of these "misinformed" reports than actual safety violations and that he would explain to the employee why these were not violations.

My point is that people tend to immediately side with the employee and blame the company whenever alleged OSHA violations are made public. A sliced ear could have happened because the person walked into an overhead conveyor. Crushed hands and broken feet can occur when an employee isn't paying attention and handles material incorrectly despite training or a piece of properly designed equipment mechanically breaks. Just because there are fumes in an area does not mean a respirator is mandated.

Don't jump to conclusions and persecute Rivian without knowing facts.

 

[Christopher]

Im sure it’s all true…after all look at the source!

You yourself are contributing to "fake news" by changing the search term in box before taking the screenshot.

 

[R1Sky Business]

I never said it didn’t happen, in fact I said it’s all true.

The article should be written after the fact with facts, but that wouldn’t generate clicks

I just don’t let the clickbait driven news full of “sources say” off the hook easily. The amount of fake and later retracted in the fine print news is fairly sickening at this point. If there’s any truth to the article I hope Rivian addresses it quickly.

.

Elon!!!!

 

[VSG]

You yourself are contributing to "fake news" by changing the search term in box before taking the screenshot.

Yes, but give him credit for clearly citing his "sources" so that we can see exactly what he did. It is because he posted the picture that we can reproduce what he did and decide for ourselves whether his conclusions are based on fact.

The real misinformation problem comes from people who post and repeat information without trying to corroborate it first themselves. They are not adding any value, they are just spreading rumors. Justifying it as "a lot of people are saying" is a cop out and is a juvenile way of trying to avoid responsibility for your actions by attributing things to other people and saying you had nothing to do with them - but if YOU are the one that spreads the information, then YOU are responsible for what you say.

 

[EBEG]

I had the pleasure of picking up my R1T at the factory in September. My son and I had a tour of the factory from the catwalk that lasted about 1 hour. It was a fantastic experience.

While I certainly cannot speak to specifics about any of the conditions mentioned, I can say that everything appeared orderly, clean and calm. In fact, while we were there, the line stopped twice - for what reason I have no idea. Our factory tour guide said the line stops all the time - but that it stops less than it used to.

I think when you are manufacturing a complex object like an R1 model, there are many objects, procedures and people involved. The process won't be perfect and someone will complain about something. Someone will cut corners and disregard safety. But having been at the factory, I don't see corner-cutting or disregard for safety as a strategy coming from the top.

 

[av8or]

You yourself are contributing to "fake news" by changing the search term in box before taking the screenshot.

Did you miss my followup post? I did a search, “fake news from Bloomberg“ then when I saw they had been fined for said fake news, I erased the “fake news from” portion and was going to search “Bloomberg fined for fake news”. Then decided f’it this is plenty. No need for conspiracy theories……..check my avatar. It’s not flat, we checked.

 

[Dark-Fx]

I work in Manufacturing at a Tier I supplier. Employees are very creative at finding ways to do things wrong.

People get hurt at auto plants a lot. There are a lot of dangerous operations and a lot of workers.

Part of my job as a controls engineer in my past life was to think up ways people could intentionally get themselves injured by misusing the equipment, and prevent them from being able to do that. Because there are those people out there.

Not saying that's what's happening here. Mistakes do happen, but it's impossible to stop everything.

 

[Kidentist]

Who remembers Elon's "Production Hell"???

See, to me the biggest cocern would be the corrupt Pieces of S**t from the UAW union sticking their paws in Rivian.

 

[atebit]

SNL was at its best back when they captioned audience members on the way to a commercial.

 

[COdogman]

Who remembers Elon's "Production Hell"???

See, to me the biggest cocern would be the corrupt Pieces of S**t from the UAW union sticking their paws in Rivian.

The UAW is nowhere near as corrupt as Elon himself.

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