Two days before Father's Day, Trisha Quinn was grappling with how her nieces and nephews would face their first without their father, Timothy Quinn. The 39-year-old had worked at the Clairton Coke Works, one of US Steel's largest production sites and the largest of its kind in the western hemisphere, for 18 years. Last August, he and colleague Steven Menefee were killed in an explosion at the plant, just months after Nippon Steel acquired US Steel for $14.9bn.
“His girlfriend called me and said they couldn’t find him,” Quinn recalls. “There was absolutely no communication [from the company]. We were calling all the local hospitals; I put myself on the news, to look for him. Then I got told to contact someone in the union. Then some ladies from the company came out to my mom’s house to share the news that he was deceased.”
Fatal Explosion and Legal Action
Quinn has since filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Nippon Steel and two other companies, alleging negligence. According to the US Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, a federal agency, the cast iron valve that failed during a cleaning operation was manufactured in 1953. US Steel, which has an annual revenue of more than $15bn, stated that pressure buildup inside the gas valve caused it to fail, leading to a series of explosions.
“He was in there when the explosion occurred,” says Trisha. “It isn’t right, you’re at work, it’s not supposed to happen.”
Unfulfilled Investment Promises
Despite pledging $11bn to upgrade the steel plants it acquired last year, Nippon Steel has made no effort to develop clean-fuel production at its three facilities in western Pennsylvania’s Mon Valley, one of the most polluted regions in the US for sulfur dioxide and hydrogen sulfide. Instead, Nippon only plans to open a coal-free, integrated steel mill in Arkansas. US Steel says it plans to reach net zero by 2050.
In Braddock, 14 miles down the Monongahela River, US Steel announced this month that the 150-year-old Edgar Thomson Works would get a new hot strip mill. For locals, this project would increase air pollution. “They promised investment, it was supposed to be better. Us and Clairton have the worst air quality,” says Nathan Mallory, a local resident and council member.
Community Concerns and Pressure
Mallory and other councilmembers claim they have been pressured by US Steel to vote on a resolution allowing a new sewer connector for the plant, without being fully informed of the mill project's extent. Mallory lives within earshot of the plant; more than 70% of Braddock’s population is Black, and the town’s per capita income is just $15,500. Thousands live within a two-mile radius.
“There has been years and years of citations [for pollution and other issues] under US Steel; there is this notion that it’s cheaper for US Steel to pay the health department citations … than it is to put containment equipment, a technology that does exist, on the existing blast furnaces or to replace them with something cleaner,” says Mallory. “We’re just fodder to the industry. It’s all corporation and government agreements. When you try to advocate [for the community], it’s all convoluted on purpose; it protects the industry over the people.”
Safety Protocols and Health Risks
US Steel says its equipment is consistently refurbished and maintained. A spokesperson wrote: “We have strengthened several safety protocols based on the investigation results. Multi-disciplinary teams collaborated to establish standardized best practices for industrial valve cleaning to provide operational safety, prevent hazardous leaks, and maintain a controlled work environment. Employees have completed comprehensive training on these new program elements and procedural changes.”
Researchers, however, argue that failing to invest in green-energy steel production in the Mon Valley could cost thousands of future jobs, and that Nippon’s planned $2.5bn investment in coal-fuel facilities risks residents' health. Matthew Mehalik, executive director of the Breathe Project, says: “The responsibility for worker deaths, and the deaths of many community residents every year from pollution-related cancer, heart disease, and lung disease is rooted in US Steel’s dependence on coal-based technology, combined with a ‘drive it til the wheels fall off’ approach to managing this [Clairton Coke Works] facility. The only way to ensure a long-term, safer, cleaner future for Mon Valley workers and fenceline community members is to replace coal-based steelmaking equipment with clean, coal-free, next-generation technology in well-maintained, new processes.”
Asthma rates among children living near the plants are triple the national rate. Environmentalists say US Steel’s own reporting shows the new hot strip mill would increase particle pollution by up to 40%.
History of Incidents and Fines
The explosion that killed Quinn and Menefee was not the only one at Clairton Coke Works last year. In February 2025, two workers were injured in a smokestack explosion. In 2009, a maintenance worker died from a gas leak, and in 2010, 15 workers suffered severe burns in another explosion. After a 2018 fire, US Steel promised $1bn across its three Mon Valley Works facilities to curb pollution, but shelved the plan within two years.
In February, the US labor department cited US Steel and MPW Industrial Services Inc, fining them $118,214 and $61,473 respectively for unsafe conditions in the fatal explosion, finding that US Steel failed to use required safety management and energy control practices for hazardous work involving flammable gas. Menefee’s family has also filed a lawsuit alleging negligence against Nippon Steel, MPW Industrial Services Inc, and Valves Incorporated, the latter two being contractors tied to the explosion. US Steel would not comment on compensating the families but noted: “We continue to cooperate with relevant government agencies and hold the employees who were injured or lost during the August 11th incident in our thoughts.”
For the Quinn family, with over 60 years of steel industry work, the meaning has changed. “His son wanted to be a steel worker, but we said, ‘No, that’s not an option.’ I don’t want to jeopardize his life,” says Trisha Quinn.
