Flash player is required to view weather conditions. Download

site web  

MIDDLETOWN — A 26-year-old man is dead following an apparent industrial accident at AK Steel early this morning, the third fatal accident at the facility in fewer than three years.

Mike Lewis of West Carrollton was fatally injured at AK Steel, 1801 Crawford St., around 2 a.m. this morning, Aug. 24, while working in a truck maintenance area, according to Middletown police.

Lewis was an employee of a contractor employed by RMB Enterprises, according to police. He appeared to be changing a tire on a tractor-trailer at the time of the incident, police said.

This is the second death involving an employee of RMB Enterprises, a Fostoria-based contractor, at AK Steel in the past 18 months.

RMB has been working with AK Steel for almost 10 years, said Jeff Beck, RMB's general manager. The company's employees transport steel coils from place to place inside the facility and are charged with doing routine maintenance on trucks that transport the coils.

Beck said RMB contacted the Occupational Safety and Health Administration this morning and that OSHA investigators are scheduled to be on site Monday, Aug. 25.

"We have 12 very specific job safety procedures dealing with all the tire work we do," he said. "The early signs appear that all the procedures were being followed."

Beck said Lewis had been working for RMB for nearly a year. He is survived by his wife, a 13-year-old daughter and an 11-year-old son, Beck said.

"It's a tragic loss to everyone here at RMB," he said. "He was a great employee and good family man. He coached his girl's basketball team and was very well liked by those he worked with at the company and in the mill."

Deputy Coroner Terrance Conti and investigator Clint Nigg responded to the scene, according to Butler County Coroner Dr. Richard Burkhardt. An autopsy is scheduled for Monday morning.

On March 3, 2007, a man working for RMB at AK Steel was killed instantly and another man was injured. The two were changing a tire on a tractor-trailer inside the plant when the tire separated from the rim and exploded.

The tires are "heavy duty" and intended for transport of 45,000-pound steel coils, RMB officials said then.

On May 4, 2006, a 54-year-old man was working in the coke plant when he was struck by a moving piece of coke plant equipment. The plant worker died later aboard a medical helicopter en route to a Dayton hospital.

For more on this issue, keep your browser here.